Unlike most of his political contemporaries – such as Norman Manley of Jamaica and Sir Grantley Herbert Adams of Barbados, who were distinguished lawyers, and Trinidadian Eric Williams, a scholar – Bird had little formal education except primary schooling.

He gave up the Salvation Army because he saw the way the landowners were treating the local black Antiguans and Barbudans, so he decided to leave his post to fight for the freedom of his people.

The union entered electoral politics for the first time in 1946 and Bird won, in a by-election, a seat in the legislature and was appointed a member of the Executive Council.

The ministerial system was introduced in 1956 and the Governor gave Bird the trade and production portfolio, and when further constitutional advancement came in 1960, he was named Chief Minister.

In 1967, Antigua became the first Eastern Caribbean island to receive the associated statehood constitution from Britain that gave internal self-government but with London remaining responsible for foreign policy and defence.

Out of the split, the Antigua Workers Union was formed and later the Progressive Labour Movement (PLM), and Bird decided to resign because he felt it was not right to hold both positions.

A common criticism from the Antiguan public is the corruption and cronyism within the Labour Party, with many claiming the government is essentially a "family business" with the continuance of the Bird dynasty in control of political power as unquestioned.

The Antiguan author Jamaica Kincaid compared the Bird government to the François Duvalier dictatorship in Haiti in her politically charged narrative A Small Place.

Bird was a member of an elite group of militant trade unionists who blazed a trail through colonial times up to or near the political independence of the Caribbean countries.

Bird, an imposing figure (standing at 7 feet tall) even in his last years, was astute enough to recognise that those benefits would be limited as long as the big landowners held control of the government.