[George Nicoll]. British Labour politician, born at Lochie, Scotland, on the 2nd of January 1859. For many years he worked as an engineer, and in 1892 was appointed assistant secretary of the Amalgamated Society of Engineers, becoming its general secretary in 1896. In 1903 he went with the Mosely educational commission to the United States. In 1895 he had unsuccessfully contested Rochdale, but in 1906 was elected as Labour member for the Blackfriars (now Gorbals) division of Glasgow, where he defeated Mr. Bonar Law. This seat he retained in the general elections of 1910 and 1918. On Mr. Lloyd George’s accession to power in 1916, Mr. Barnes joined his ministry as Minister of Pensions, and the same year was sworn of the Privy Council, but in August 1917 resigned his office in order to enter the War Cabinet as representative of Labour, succeeding Mr. Arthur Henderson. In 1918 when the Labour party left the Coalition Mr. Barnes continued in the Coalition Government as minister without portfolio. He attended the Peace Conference at Paris as a Labour representative, and afterwards attended the Internaltional Labour Conference at Washington. He resigned in January 1920 from the Cabinet.
