By Andrew Macdonald
As part of our coverage of the death this week of Billy Joe MacLean, 89, the following article is from a conversation in 2018, when I asked him the secret to his success in a political career of more than 50 years.
MacLean, a Cape Breton politician from 1962 to 2016, began his political career as a municipal politician when John F. Kennedy was president of the United States.
In the 1980s, MacLean became a cabinet minister in the provincial government of John Buchanan. He only lasted for two terms in the Nova Scotia government before returning to Port Hawkesbury, where he was elected mayor. He eventually retired as the longest-serving politician in Atlantic Canada in 2016.
In 2018, I caught up to MacLean at his cottage at Dundee on the Bras d’Or Lake and asked the secret of his political longevity and electoral success.
“I had many, many councillors and wardens over the years. My favourite advice to them was ‘always remember you don’t own the job’,” he told me then.
“The job is owned by the people and they loan it to you for a while—and don’t get disappointed when they take it back. Hopefully, you had the opportunity to serve them well, but it belongs to the people and remember that all the time you are in politics.”
The folksy politico always championed the ‘little guy’. In 2018, MacLean endorsed Cecil Clarke for leader of the Nova Scotia Progressive Conservative Party. There were five candidates for that job. Tim Houston won that race and is now premier. Cecil Clarke is now mayor of Cape Breton Regional Municipality.
“I met with both Cecil and (fellow candidate) Tim Houston,” said MacLean, who, when he was president of the Union of Nova Scotia Municipalities, got to know Clarke.
“I worked with Cecil to get the assessment cap removed and Houston fought to keep it, I found out,” MacLean said.
“I said that cap has got to go. For example, if you bought a house 10 years ago and you got a cap, but if you sell it to a young person, they have to keep the cap for 10 years, and they wind up with a $1,500 tax bill,” said MacLean.
“Cecil was a good minister when he was in government. He ran a good ship in Sydney and got them out of debt,” he said.
“He can be criticized for getting things in Sydney Harbour and getting the provincial government to go along with it, but I think I would be doing the same thing.
“He has a much greater, wider broader experience, not only in running a city, but also as a minister of four different portfolios,” MacLean told The Macdonald Notebook.
A side note: MacLean had been married to the gracious Glenda for 63 years at the time of his death this week. He was 89.
Billy Joe MacLean was truly devoted to his wife, Glenda. Billy Joe was a true man of the People.
In the early 1980s, Billy Joe MacLean welcomes Terry Fox to Port Hawkesbury.
