Mark Clarke (politician)
[5]: 2:45 He is a great nephew of Dominica's first female prime minister, Dame Mary Eugenia Charles,[5]: 1:50 and a grandson of Bertie Clarke, a Barbados-born member of the West Indies Cricket Team.
[5]: 2:22 Bertie Clarke came to Britain in 1939 to play cricket against England, but could not return home because of the outbreak of World War II; he then trained as a general practitioner, and had a daughter, Madeline, who would become Mark's mother.
[7] History Storytime was launched in 2018,[8] following the sexual harassment case made against him at previous employer Unilever earlier in the year, but the limited company was dissolved on 5 April 2022.
[12] He would later become the elected chairman of Conservative Future between 2006 and 2008 and he also came to prominence in the Young Britons' Foundation as their director of outreach,[1] an organisation headed by Donal Blaney at the time.
Clarke has repeatedly denied allegations against him of misconduct and criminal activity that contributed to widespread national media coverage after the death of Elliott Johnson.
"[18] Nevertheless, reputable media outlets continued to publish allegations centred on Clarke's activities, which included: After the suicide of Conservative Party activist Elliott Johnson, quick measures were enacted to close down the activities of organisations and people who were alleged to have failed in their duty of care of young activists or were implicated in the bullying of them.
The first measure was to immediately ban some activists, including Clarke and his associate Andre Walker, from attending the annual Conservative Party Conference in 2015.
One of their first actions was to write to all regional Conservative Future branches asking them to immediately cancel any social functions they had organised over the Christmas period stating that it would be improper for such events to continue.
A statement issued by a spokesman for Blaney denied that the resignation was related to anything other than his need to spend more time caring for his wife and concentrating on business interests in USA.
[27] Previous to their resignations, both Blaney and Abbott had become entangled in the Tatler Tory scandal, having received media attention and questions about their making redundant Elliott Johnson two weeks before he committed suicide; Blaney also became focus of an LBC interview with Iain Dale where his formerly close connections with Clarke were scrutinised, and his being the founder of Young Britons' Foundation which was alleged to be a radicalising force in right wing youth political training and educated some of the protagonists of the Tatler Tory scandal, including Clarke.
[26] The Guardian newspaper quoted an unnamed source at Conservative Way Forward stating that a contributing factor to both Blaney's and Abbott's resignations was the pressure caused over Elliott Johnson's death: "My understanding is they're stepping down from those roles.
Paul Abbott, who was formerly the chief of staff for Grant Shapps MP, who in turn resigned on 29 November over his role in the reintroduction of Clarke into the Conservative Party, was thanked by the Johnson family for his assistance in helping them understand the circumstances around Elliott's death.
[citation needed] An appeal was lodged and with publicity from The Mirror and Daily Mail it was reported on 11 February that a new case for charges of harassment against Clarke was being considered.
During the episode his contemporary, Conservative MP Ben Howlett, spoke about his personal efforts to counter institutional bullying in the youth wing of the Party.
