Still lamenting Tory merger, Clark bids farewell

By JEFF SALLOT
From Friday's Globe and Mail

(Ottawa)  He came to national political leadership as Joe Who? He leaves
public life as The Man Without a Party. Joe Clark, the former prime
minister whose term of office is numbered in fleeting months, left the
House of Commons for the final time yesterday, almost 25 years to the day
after his most triumphant moment in politics.

On May 22, 1979, Mr. Clark led his Tories to a slim victory in a federal
election, thwarting the ambitions of Pierre Trudeau's Liberals for a fourth
consecutive term. But the Tory minority government fell on a confidence
motion before Christmas, and the Liberals won the subsequent election.

"The Liberals wheeled in every MP who could draw a breath,"
bringing some in from sick beds to defeat the Tories on that confidence
motion, Mr. Clark recalled in his final speech to the House. His deep voice
broke into a characteristic chuckle as he joked about the cobwebs being
swept away from the desks of long-absent Liberal MPs who showed up that
night for the fateful vote.

But he had no funny story to tell about how former colleagues in the Tory
caucus joined forces with the Canadian Alliance, morphing the party he led
until last year into the new amalgamated Conservative Party that will
challenge the Liberals in the coming election. "I'm very troubled by
the disappearance of my party," he said later in a scrum with
reporters on the stone steps to the Centre Block rotunda as tourists
whispered to each other, "That's Joe Clark," and snapped
pictures.

But he was Joe Who? to a mischievous Toronto Star headline writer in 1976
when the young and relatively unknown rookie MP from Alberta surprised
everyone but himself to become the last leadership candidate standing on
the final ballot of the Tory convention, outlasting the likes of Brian
Mulroney, Flora MacDonald, Claude Wagner and Jack Horner. At The Globe and
Mail, grey-haired copy editors argued with younger political reporters
about whether the wife of the new Tory leader should be styled Mrs. Clark
or, as she preferred, by her own name, Maureen McTeer.

Ms. McTeer (the reporters won) proudly watched from the public gallery
yesterday as politicians from all parties paid tribute to her husband. With
her was their daughter, Catherine Clark, who grew up in the public eye and
in the gardens of Stornoway, the residence of the Leader of the Official
Opposition.

Mr. Clark's voice cracked with emotion for the first and only time
yesterday when he thanked Ms. McTeer for her support during his three
decades of public life. "Maureen, Catherine and I, under fire, have
learned something about family values," he said.

Mr. Clark, who turns 65 next month, will not seek re-election in his
Calgary riding, but come election day, he said, "I'll cast a secret
ballot."

He and Ms. McTeer plan a year living abroad, probably near some university
campus, maybe in Washington, London or California. Mr. Clark said he is not
looking for a federal appointment, and he is leaving public life for good.

Mr. Clark was first elected to Parliament in the general election of 1972
after a failed run at the Alberta legislature. He lost the leadership of
the party to Mr. Mulroney in 1983, but stayed on as a cabinet minister
after the 1984 election. He left politics briefly in the early 1990s, but
returned for his second stint as Progressive Conservative leader in 1998.

Prime Minister Paul Martin, who was attending to private business, his
office said, was not in the House for the tributes. Deputy Prime Minister
Anne McLellan spoke for the Liberals, praising her fellow Albertan as a man
who never forgot his roots as the son of the local newspaper editor in High
River. Like his father, she said, Mr. Clark loved language and knew the
power of words. "The honourable member can say more in 35 seconds than
others can in 35 minutes."

MPs from all parties broke into a chant -- "Joe, Joe, Joe."

As foreign affairs minister in the Mulroney government, Mr. Clark worked
tirelessly toward ending the apartheid system of institutionalized racism
in South Africa, Ms. McLellan said. "His commitment to Progressive
Conservatism has never wavered," she said, stressing the P-word that
the new Tories have dropped.

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper described Mr. Clark as "a historic
figure" who was in Parliament for some of the most crucial moments of
the past 30 years. Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe praised Mr. Clark
for reaching out to Quebeckers as intergovernmental affairs minister and as
opposition leader, speaking to them in their own language.


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