CANADA STINGY IN ITS TREATMENT OF FORMER PMs
Arthur Milnes makes sure the living ones are in his sesquicentennial time capsule.
Arthur Milnes and his wife, Alison, embarked upon a special project to mark Canada’s sesquicentennial year: a time capsule. But rather than filling it with things from around their home in Kingston, the pair have reached out far and wide to people, places and institutions around the globe with any connection to this country. The responses, from small towns to celebrities, has been overwhelming. This is the latest in a series of columns on his Canada 150 time capsule.
It is not until you travel outside our borders with a past Canadian prime minister that you learn how very truly small our country can be.
Canada has largely chosen, for whatever reason, not to offer even basic support to its past political leaders.
In Africa, Europe and the United States, where I have had the privilege in my work over the years to accompany or assist a past Canadian prime minister — of any party — foreigners are shocked at how dismissive Canada is about those who once led our country.
With situational exceptions, and despite the fact we exist as a G7 nation in the post-9/11 world, we do not even provide them security. It is that fact that often shocks foreigners the most.
Foreigners also shake their heads when you tell them that, until at least a decade ago — and I have honestly not checked since — the same country provided office support for life and extended that to the spouse and to past governors general.
What makes all this so important to discuss today is the very real fact that our country is blessed with more former prime ministers who are alive and still willing to serve — seven of them — than at any time in our nation’s history since 1867.
And that’s a long way of saying that when Alison and I began sending our letters around the world to ask for contributions to populate our Canada 150 time capsule, we made sure to try to honour each of the seven past prime ministers — be they Liberal or Conservative — and the sitting PM — Justin Trudeau — as best we could.
And, we also tried to do the same for the 15 past prime ministers who are no longer alive.
As Brian Mulroney was the 18th prime minister of Canada, and Ulysses S. Grant the 18th U.S. president, a couple of towns in America had no problem declaring July 1 U.S. Grant-Brian Mulroney-Canada Day in their communities.
Sir Wilfrid Laurier loved Abraham Lincoln more than any other historic figure.
So Gladstone, an Illinois town where a Lincoln-Douglas debate was once held — an event that Laurier sometimes discussed before Canadian audiences — issued a proclamation declaring July 1 Abraham Lincoln-Sir Wilfrid LaurierCanada Day.
A town in Oklahoma was honoured to declare July 1 Grover Cleveland-Stephen HarperCanada Day to honour the 22nd president and the 22nd prime minister, respectively. Lester Pearson, he got a day. And, of course, Borden as well. So did John Abbott. But, in fairness, the short shrift given past PMs may be changing. Justin Trudeau is the son of a past prime minister. He’d be all too aware of the world his late father was thrown into, with hardly any support after his father’s 16 years of public service shaping Canada.
I have noticed the current prime minister’s willingness to call on his father’s political enemy, Mulroney, or his willingness to praise the public service of Harper and the entire Harper family, since Trudeau took office. And, let’s also recall that it was Harper, as prime minister, who reached across history and partisanship and invited each and every past prime minister alive to help him, on behalf of all Canadians, honour Nelson Mandela at the latter’s memorial.
I can only hope that Andrew Scheer and the next leader of the NDP have noticed this as well.
Perhaps now, finally, our past PMs are on the verge of being properly honoured and supported.
But until that happens, Alison and I have ensured that all 23 PMs — particularly the seven former prime ministers now alive — are honoured in our Canada 150 time capsule.