David MacDonald (politician)

Not to be confused with David McDonald (politician).

For other people of the same name, see David MacDonald (disambiguation).

David Samuel Horne MacDonald, PC (born August 20, 1936 in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island) is a United Church of Canada minister and a former Canadian politician, and author.

David MacDonald was ordained in the United Church by the Maritime Conference on June 11, 1961, and was a minister at Alberton, Tignish, and Cascumpec, Prince Edward Island before going into federal politics.

He was first elected to the Canadian House of Commons as a Progressive Conservative Member of Parliament (MP) from the former Prince Edward Island riding of Prince in the 1965 election, and was re-elected in the realigned Egmont riding from 1968 until 1979.

After the Tory victory in the 1979 election, he was appointed Minister of Communications, Minister responsible for the Status of Women and Secretary of State for Canada in the short-lived Cabinet of Prime Minister Joe Clark.

MacDonald lost his seat to Liberal George Henderson in the 1980 election but returned to the House as MP in the Toronto riding of Rosedale in the 1988 election, replacing former Toronto Mayor and PC incumbent David Crombie.

However, he lost his seat again to a Liberal majority government in the 1993 election, this time to Bill Graham. Two other notable candidates ran against MacDonald in this election: future New Democratic Party (NDP) leader Jack Layton, and magician Doug Henning for the Natural Law Party of Canada.

MacDonald also spent time in Africa between parliamentary duties.

MacDonald had a reputation as a Red Tory (i.e., left-leaning), and subsequently switched his political allegiance to the social democratic New Democratic Party of Canada. He ran as the NDP candidate in his old riding (now called Toronto Centre-Rosedale) in the 1997 election, but was defeated again by Graham.

MacDonald was romantically involved with time as leader of the federal NDP, Alexa McDonough prior to his 1997 candidacy. However, they split up prior to the 2004 federal election. MacDonald has since started another relationship and married.

On November 25, 1998, The United Church of Canada appointed MacDonald a Special Advisor on residential schools, in light of major lawsuits against the UCC from former students.

Electoral record

Toronto Centre—Rosedale

Canadian federal election, 1997
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%
	Liberal	Bill Graham	22,945	49.19	-0.80
	New Democratic	David MacDonald	9,597	20.58	+9.80
	Progressive Conservative	Stephen Probyn	8,993	19.28	-1.96
	Reform	John Stewart	3,646	7.82	-4.65
	Green	Jim Harris	577	1.24	+0.30
	Canadian Action	Anthony Robert Pedrette	303	0.65
	Natural Law	Ron Parker	270	0.58	-1.01
	Marxist–Leninist	Steve Rutchinski	166	0.36	+0.25
	Independent	Ted W. Culp	145	0.31
Total valid votes			46,642	100.00

Rosedale

Canadian federal election, 1993: Rosedale
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%	Expenditures
	Liberal	Bill Graham	27,707	49.98	–	$54,087
	Progressive Conservative	David MacDonald	12,018	21.68		$60,961
	Reform	Daniel Jovkovic	7,048	12.71		$25,016
	New Democratic Party	Jack Layton	5,937	10.71		$44,872
	National	Martin Lanigan	1,091	1.97		$6,964
	Natural Law	Doug Henning	839	1.51		$37,086
	Green	Leslie Hunter	479	0.86		$380
	N/A (Christian Freedom)	Linda Dale Gibbons	214	0.39		$200
	Marxist-Leninist	Steve Rutchinski	61	0.11		$205
	Abolitionist	Y. Patrice d'Audibert-Garcien	43	0.08		$0
Total valid votes			55,437	100.00
Total rejected ballots			491
Turnout			55,928	61.71
Electors on the lists			90,630
Source: Thirty-fifth General Election, 1993: Official Voting Results, Published by the Chief Electoral Officer of Canada. Financial figures taken from official contributions and expenses provided by Elections Canada.

Canadian federal election, 1988
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%
	Progressive Conservative	David MacDonald	22,704	41.36	-11.44
	Liberal	Bill Graham	22,624	41.21	+15.08
	New Democratic	Doug Wilson	8,266	15.06	-2.77
	Libertarian	Chris Blatchly	411	0.75	+0.09
	Green	Frank de Jong	397	0.72	-1.15
	Rhinoceros	Liane McLarty	265	0.48
	Independent	Mike Constable	102	0.19
	Independent	Harry Margel	91	0.17
	Commonwealth of Canada	Paul Therrien	33	0.06	-0.27
Total valid votes			54,893	100.00

Egmont

Canadian federal election, 1980
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%
	Liberal	George Henderson	8,639	52.37	+12.93
	Progressive Conservative	David MacDonald	7,033	42.63	-13.44
	New Democratic	Vincent Gallant	824	5.00	+0.51
Total valid votes			16,496	100.00

Canadian federal election, 1979
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%
	Progressive Conservative	David MacDonald	8,861	56.07	+3.82
	Liberal	Bill Reese	6,233	39.44	-4.81
	New Democratic	Vincent Gallant	710	4.49	+0.98
Total valid votes			15,804	100.00

Canadian federal election, 1974
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%
	Progressive Conservative	David MacDonald	7,583	52.25	-3.53
	Liberal	Bill Reese	6,422	44.25	+3.97
	New Democratic	Cletus Shea	509	3.51	-0.04
Total valid votes			14,514	100.00

Canadian federal election, 1972
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%
	Progressive Conservative	David MacDonald	7,868	55.78	+2.26
	Liberal	George W. Olscamp	5,681	40.28	-4.02
	New Democratic	Carroll L. Kadey	501	3.55	+1.37
	Social Credit	Hugh G. Ryan	55	0.39
Total valid votes			14,105	100.00

Canadian federal election, 1968
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
	Progressive Conservative	David MacDonald	7,182	53.52
	Liberal	J. Melville Campbell	5,945	44.30
	New Democratic	Harvey Dawson	292	2.18
Total valid votes			13,419	100.00

Prince

Canadian federal election, 1965
Party		Candidate	Votes
	Progressive Conservative	David MacDonald	9,082
	Liberal	John Watson MacNaught	8,312
	New Democratic	Harvey Dawson	384

External links

• David MacDonald (politician) – Parliament of Canada biography
• United Church of Canada's appointment as Special Advisor for Residential Schools

Parliament of Canada
Preceded by J. Watson MacNaught, Liberal	Member of Parliament from Prince 1965–1968	Succeeded by Riding abolished
Preceded by Riding Created	Member of Parliament from Egmont 1968–1980	Succeeded by George Henderson, Liberal
Preceded by David Crombie, Progressive Conservative	Member of Parliament from Toronto Centre 1988–1993	Succeeded by Bill Graham, Liberal
Political offices
Preceded by Marc Lalonde	Minister responsible for the Status of Women 4 June 1979 – 2 March 1980	Succeeded by Lloyd Axworthy