The Clydebank Rent Strike was one of the key events in the legend of Red Clydeside.
Between 1914 and 1918, housing became scarce in Clydebank as the burgh was inundated with people seeking work in local shipyards and munitions industries. During the same period, war-time inflation pushed up the cost of building new houses and repairing the old. After the passing of the Rent and Mortgage Interest (War Restrictions) Act in 1915, freezing rents at their 1914 levels until the end of the war, landlords were unable to recover increased costs from their tenants. By the time of the Armistice in 1918, property building, maintenance and management costs were estimated to have risen by 180 per cent.