H. James Jones

Who is H. James Jones?

H. James Jones is a Canadian politician. He served in the Canadian House of Commons from 1997 to 2000, initially as a Progressive Conservative and later as a member of the Canadian Alliance.

Jones was born in Warwick, Ontario, and received a degree in Business Administration from Ryerson Polytechnical Institute in 1967. He became a Certified General Accountant in 1971. Jones was an internal auditor of the Moore Corporation from 1967 to 1969, and a Marketing Manager at IBM Canada Ltd. from 1969 to 1997. He began his political career at the municipal level, serving as a councillor in Markham's third ward from 1988 to 1997.

He was elected to the Canadian House of Commons in the 1997 federal election, defeating Liberal candidate Gobinder Randhawa by 3,639 votes in Markham. Jones was the only Progressive Conservative candidate elected in Ontario in this election, and some credited his win to local dissatisfaction over the previous Member of Parliament, Jag Bhaduria. Bhaduria had been elected as a Liberal, but resigned from the party amid controversy soon after the election.

Jones was on the right-wing of the Progressive Conservative Party. He initially supported Brian Pallister in the first round of the PC Party's 1998 leadership election, though he later endorsed Joe Clark on the second ballot before Pallister officially withdrew. He later became a supporter of the United Alternative movement, and in 2000 floated the idea of seeking re-election with co-endorsements from the Progressive Conservatives and the newly formed Canadian Alliance, a successor to the Reform Party.