MPPs’ grief following death of Liberal backbencher genuine (03/31/04)

Adeath in the legislature has prompted a lot of fuss and many may feel it has been overdone. Dominic Agostino, a respected and sometimes rambunctious Liberal backbencher died recently.

MPPs closed the legislature for two days, although they often have been accused of not sitting enough to deal with the public’s concerns.

Premier Dalton McGuinty’s voice was described as cracking with emotion when he reported “with deep sadness a short while ago our friend and colleague passed away.”

Progressive Conservative spokesman John Baird was noted as grief-stricken when he talked of his admiration for a tough debater who was “our party’s worst nightmare.”

Leader Howard Hampton said New Democrats had empathy because Agostino was a scrappy, fearless fighter like NDP MPPs are.

Ministers were in tears talking to reporters, flags flew at half-staff, and the staid Canadian Press news agency, which normally does not allow commentary to creep in, reported “the Ontario government was paralyzed with grief.”

Outsiders will wonder why there was so much agony and how much was genuine, but they would not know the bonds that exist between many, not all, elected to a legislature.

They spend a lot of time together, sometimes more than with their spouses, and talk and fight, but often a fight earns respect and is forgotten when the legislature adjourns.

Most in the end accept those in other parties have different views but are in politics believing they can improve the community.

They also are conscious they belong to a rare group, only 103 MPPs chosen from a 12-million population, often called “the most exclusive club in Ontario,” and share vulnerability in they have to knock on doors to get elected and voters can reject them.

When a former MPP dies, members of each party traditionally deliver eulogies that run on forever and sometimes seem more to honour their own profession, but this can be forgiven because they are offered only rare opportunities to do so, while enduring much criticism.

Few MPPs have died while still serving, but when they do the commemoration is prodigious, much like police from across the continent attend the funeral of one of their own.

The last was Al Palladini, a former car dealer noted for his upbeat nature, who stepped down as a minister only weeks before dying of a heart attack on a golf course in 2001.

Federal politicians including then Tory leader Joe Clark were among 1,500 at his funeral and the hard-nosed premier Mike Harris was red-eyed and fighting back tears as he said “somewhere up there Al is playing the back nine.”

When Jim Renwick, a corporate lawyer and Tory who joined the NDP and gave it huge depth, died in 1984, his desk was draped with black cloth. Tory premier William Davis, who would have loved to have Renwick on his side, said his contributions were above partisan politics.

Only one minister has died in office in recent years, John Rhodes, who was industry minister and had a heart attack on a trade mission to Iran in 1978.

The legislature thought so highly of him it held a memorial service in its main lobby, an almost unheard-of event. Many of his comments were recalled fondly.

Once Rhodes, the minister responsible for creating jobs in Ontario, defined a Canadian as someone who leaves a French movie, climbs in his German car, drives to an Italian restaurant, orders Dutch beer and Danish cheese and, once home, takes off his Korean shirt, Romanian pants and Polish shoes and puts on his Taiwanese pyjamas. Then he turns on his Japanese stereo, picks up his U.S.-made pen and writes to his MP protesting about high unemployment. Politicians with such insight are hard to let go.