KINGSTON, Jamaica — After 23 consecutive years in the Senate, veteran parliamentarian and trade unionist, Navel Clarke, says he thinks that it is time to move on.

Clarke’s 23 years in the Senate is only bettered by former Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) member, Oswald Harding, who spent 25 consecutive years (1977-2002), during which he served as President (twice) and Leader of Government Business and Leader of Opposition Business over a total of 29 years.

Clarke’s absence means that for the first time in decades, the National Workers Union (NWU), an affiliate of the People’s National Party (PNP) will not have a representative in the Senate representing the party’s links with the labour movement and the workers.

What is even more interesting is that among the Opposition’s eight senators is another trade union leader, Lambert Brown, who heads the University and Allied Workers Union (UAWU). The UAWU is not aligned to the PNP, but was once linked to the leftist Workers Party of Jamaica, formerly headed another previous PNP senator, Dr Trevor Munroe.

Clarke had been a member of the Senate since 1993, following in the tradition of NWU senators, including Michael Manley and Clive Dobson, and has sat in every Senate since then.

He said that he has not sought to return this time, because he thinks that he has served his time.

“I think that I have done what I had to do for my country, and it is time to move on,” Clarke told OBSERVER ONLINE. However, he says that he does not believe that age should by a priority in determining who should sit in Parliament.

“I agree that new ideas are always needed, but new ideas do not necessarily come from young people. People with experience are also important to the process,” he insisted.

Clarke was general secretary of the NWU and its affiliate, the Union of Clerical, Administrative and Supervisory Employees (UCASE) until 2014, when he and then NWU president, Vincent Morrison, were removed from their posts on an issue of age.

Clarke says he is considering going into industrial relations consultancy, while Morrison is now president of UCASE, which has detached itself from the NWU.

Balford Henry