The manager of a large firm engaged in carrying out public works to the value of over a million sterling, gave me at the time a frank opinion of Crooks from the employers' standpoint.
"I can't help liking that chap Crooks. But it's a pity he's on what I call the wrong side. He's been negotiating with our firm until he has compelled us to pay our men several thousand pounds a year extra in wages. And a lot of thanks they give him for it! I overhear them sometimes talking at work. They say he wouldn't have got them more money if he hadn't been getting something out of it himself. Now if Crooks would only place his ability on the employers' side he could earn a thousand a year easily."
For ten years after he entered public life Crooks was content with the same five-roomed house in Northumberland Street where the deputation of working men found him when they came to invite him to stand for the County Council. When he did move it was into a neighbouring street, Gough Street, where the upgrown family had the advantage of an additional room. That remains his home to this day.
One of his ardent admirers in Poplar, a well-to-do man, on learning he was moving from Northumberland Street, offered him a house of his own rent free. It was a large and pleasant house in East India Dock Road, boasting a garden front and back. The owner implored him to take it for the rest of his life, "as a small tribute from one who appreciates the splendid public services you have rendered to Poplar."
"It would never do for me to live in such a house," was Crooks's reply in thanking the well-wisher. "My friends among the working people would fear I was deserting their class, and would not come to me as freely as they come now. My enemies would say, 'Look at that fellow Crooks; he's making his pile out of us.' A Labour man like me must leave no opening for his enemies."
We have seen, then, that the only source of Crooks's income during the first years of his public life was the £3 10s. a week paid by the Poplar Labour League. After six or seven years this salary was increased to £4 in view of his greatly widened sphere of public service. This payment was stopped in 1903, when Crooks joined the official Labour Party in the House of Commons. Then he received the usual payment of £200 a year, given to each member of that party by the Trade Unionists of the country. A small additional sum has since been voted to him annually by the Poplar League and the Woolwich Labour Representation Association to meet the out-of-pocket expenses inseparable from a Member of Parliament's life. In addition he has received an occasional fee for a public address.
Let these simple facts, then, be the answer to those people who, surprised at the amount of public work he carries out, keep asking suspiciously how he does it. Crooks himself never hesitates to speak out, either in public or private, as to his financial position.
"How do I do it?" Crooks repeats to his working class audiences. "As a pioneer of paid Labour representation I have been confronted with this question through the whole of my public career. All well and good; but why is the question not put to other politicians and public men? You working men have been the worst offenders. You never think of asking the question of such men seeking public positions as monopolists, food adulterators, scamping contractors, property sweaters, bogus company promoters, and others who fleece you at every turn. You never dream of asking it of young untried men fresh from the Universities, who in many cases are only after the spoils of office. You are inclined to regard all these people as gentlemen. But let a man from your own ranks offer to serve you in public life, and always there are a crowd of objectors, generally thickest at public-house bars, who want to know where the Labour man gets his money from? Talk about the fierce light that beats upon a throne, what is it to the fierce light turned upon a Labour representative?
"How often, as I go about, do I hear of people saying sneeringly: 'Look at that fellow Crooks. Who is he? He's only one of us, who has risen from the ranks.' You just tell these people that Will Crooks has not risen from the ranks; he is still in the ranks, standing four-square with the working classes against monopoly and privilege."