 Lang's liberal conservatism enabled him to associate easily with Socialist leaders such as Will Crooks and George Lansbury, successive mayors of Poplar; he was responsible for bringing the latter back to regular communion in the Church. In 1905 he and Lansbury joined the Central London Unemployed Body, set up by the government to tackle the region's unemployment problems. That same year Lang took as his personal assistant a young Cambridge graduate and clergyman's son, Dick Sheppard, who became a close friend and confidante. Sheppard was eventually ordained, becoming a radical clergyman and founder of the Peace Pledge Union. Lang believed that socialism was a growing force in British life, and at a Church Congress in Great Yarmouth in 1907 he speculated on how the Church should respond to this. His remarks reached The New York Times, which warned that modern socialism was often equated with unrest, that "the cry of the demagogue is in the air" and that the Church should not heed this cry.
