John Roberts; cabinet minister (Globe & Mail)
Hyfler/Rosner
The former Trudeau-era cabinet minister was elected and
defeated three times, writes SANDRA MARTIN. A man given to
romance, he was most effective during three years as
Canada's unofficial minister of culture
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20070403.OBROBERTS03/TPStory/Obituaries
An intellectual who was as charming as he was erudite, John
Roberts had three potential careers before he was 35 --
academic, diplomat and politician. He was a man of big ideas
who loved the arts, the environment and public-policy
debates, but was less adept at managing the petty details of
everyday life and love.
Mr. Roberts spent his early years in Hamilton. He was the
middle son of three children of John and Jean (nee Batty)
Roberts. The family was working class and, in the disastrous
aftermath of the depression, Mr. Roberts committed suicide
when John was about four years old, although he didn't know
the manner of his father's death until many years later. His
widowed mother moved her children to Toronto, where they
lived with family.
Mr. Roberts graduated from Oakwood Collegiate Institute and
entered the University of Toronto in the early 1950s. After
graduating with the Breuls Gold Medal in Political Science,
he went to Oxford to do a doctorate in political thought.
From there, he moved on to Paris to study at the Ecole
nationale d'administration -- where he perfected his French
and became an ardent francophile. He returned to St.
Antony's College, Oxford, and began a long association with
the political philosopher Sir Isaiah Berlin -- they
continued to correspond until the philosopher died in
1997 -- and seemed intent on an academic life.
Fate intervened, in the form of a beautiful Belgian woman by
the name Brigitte de Sterk. They had met in Paris, where her
uncle was the Belgium ambassador, and were married in 1963.
Mr. Roberts switched gears, joined the external affairs
department and took his bride to Ottawa, which by all
accounts she loathed. After three years at external affairs,
Mr. Roberts became the executive assistant to Maurice Sauvé,
who was minister of forestry and rural development in Lester
Pearson's last government.
Mr. Roberts was persuaded to run for the Liberals in the
rural Ontario riding of York-Simcoe in 1968 amid what was
forever after known as Trudeaumania, and was appointed the
parliamentary secretary to the minister of regional and
economic expansion. By this point, his marriage to Ms. de
Sterk was strained and he had met Beverly Rockett, a Toronto
model and photographer. They were married for several years
in the 1970s and he became stepfather to Eden and Robin,
daughters from Ms. Rockett's first marriage.
He lost his seat in the 1972 election but was re-elected in
1974 in the urban Toronto riding of St. Paul's. In 1976, Mr.
Trudeau appointed him secretary of state for Canada, which
essentially made him minister of culture. His long-standing
interest in the arts made this portfolio a natural for him
and he held the job for three years.
Defeated again in 1979 as the Liberals lost to Joe Clark's
Progressive Conservatives, he was re-elected once more in
1980. With his marriage to Ms. Rockett disintegrating, he
became romantically involved with Montrealer Michelle
Chicoine, a relationship that lasted for the rest of his
life.
A committed Trudeau Liberal both philosophically and
emotionally, Mr. Roberts was an important colleague for the
Prime Minister during the long years of the patriation of
the Constitution. His brief, based on his English
connections and experience, was to argue the case for
patriation with British parliamentarians. He also served as
minister of science and technology and environment minister
from 1980 to 1983. At first, he didn't think he had a
natural affinity for a double-barrelled portfolio, but he
grew to understand that the environment was a pressing and
compelling issue and he worked hard to lay the groundwork
for the acid rain treaty with the United States, eventually
ratified by Brian Mulroney's Tories. The environment was an
issue that Mr. Roberts championed for the rest of his life,
to the extent that he became an earlier supporter of
Stéphane Dion for the Liberal leadership campaign in 2006.
Mr. Roberts's final cabinet position was minister of
employment and immigration from 1983 to 1984, a rocky tenure
from which to contest the Liberal leadership, vacant after
Mr. Trudeau's departure in 1984. He didn't have a lot of
support within the party, which had largely committed itself
to electing John Turner. He wasn't helped by a scandal that
erupted in the press and the House of Commons after it
appeared that a Liberal job-creation program had made work
primarily for people in Liberal ridings. Very few insiders,
no cabinet colleagues and fewer MPs than could be counted on
the fingers of one hand supported Mr. Roberts's
compassionate platform for renewed social programs and more
government intervention in the economy. He came fourth on
the first ballot at the convention on June 16, 1984, that
eventually anointed Mr. Turner. When Mr. Turner called a
snap election that September, Mr. Roberts lost his seat by
more than 3,000 votes to Barbara MacDougall in the Mulroney
sweep.
At the age of 51, Mr. Roberts essentially retired from
politics after that election. He spent the next year or so
travelling (much of it allegedly on his ministerial Air
Canada pass), researching at Oxford, teaching at Concordia
University in Montreal and writing a book, Agenda for
Canada: Towards a New Liberalism, which Lester & Orpen
Dennys published in 1985. As for the more than $200,000 in
debt he accumulated during his unsuccessful leadership bid,
many said he seemed to have left that behind as well,
although his friend Tom Axworthy says he spent the next
decade paying it off.
He spent the next few years as a lecturer at a variety of
universities in Canada and abroad. In 1990, he ran for the
presidency of the Liberal Party, but lost to his old cabinet
colleague and leadership rival, Don Johnston. At the time,
there were rumours that Liberal insiders didn't want Mr.
Roberts running the party for fear of the expenses he would
accrue.
By the mid-1990s, his health had become seriously
compromised. He had diabetes, suffered at least one serious
heart attack and had a pacemaker implanted. He lived mostly
in the Manulife Centre in Toronto and continued to be a
charming and intellectually engaged companion eager to talk
about the arts, cultural policy, and political and
philosophical ideas.
He joined Mr. Axworthy, a Liberal strategist and former
senior aide to Mr. Trudeau, and Howard Aster, a professor of
political science and publisher of Mosaic Press, in
organizing an intellectual summit on the new liberalism at
the University of Toronto in September of 2002. The idea was
to inject new ideas into the perennial debate about such
issues as the economy, defence, social spending, sustainable
development and electoral reform.
After his political career, he was very active on the
philosophical nature of liberalism. Just this year, he
completed a manuscript on the philosophy of 19th-century
German political philosopher Wilhelm von Humboldt, the
subject of his doctoral thesis at Oxford 50 years before.
Last Friday evening, Mr. Roberts went to see Daniel McIvor
in Daniel Brooks's play House at Buddies In Bad Times
Theatre in Toronto with his stepdaughter Eden. After the
play, they enjoyed a wide-ranging discussion about the arts
in a restaurant and she drove him home. He went out again to
pick up a copy of the tabloid magazine Now to check the
listings for the film festival he expected to attend the
next day, and collapsed. He had spent his last evening doing
what he loved best: seeing a play and engaging in
conversation, said his friend, lawyer Barry Appleton.
John Roberts was born
in Hamilton on Nov. 28, 1933.
He died in Toronto of a massive
coronary on March 31, 2007.
He was 73. There is no funeral,
but a memorial service is being
planned for early May at the
University of Toronto.