Mr. Speaker, on behalf of our party I would like to say a few words in tribute to Jack Pickersgill who passed away recently.
As was mentioned before in the House, he was a very unique individual. Born in Ontario, raised in rural Manitoba and member of Parliament from the great province of Newfoundland. He was a very versatile person, a scholar, a public servant, a Prime Ministerial aid, an author, a cabinet minister and a very effective opposition parliamentarian.
He did not seek re-election in 1968 when I first came to the House, so I did not have any personal experience at seeing him perform in the House of Commons. However, when I arrived here I heard many stories about the effectiveness of Jack Pickersgill.
I suppose he was in the category of many of those extremely interesting parliamentarians of the 1950s and 1960s. I think of John Diefenbaker, Paul Martin, Senior, Tommy Douglas, Real Caouette and Jack Pickersgill, all very effective parliamentarians, the like of which we do not see often today in the House of Commons. They were members of the pre-television age in this place.
He was very effective in bringing Newfoundland into Confederation and became a very close friend of the first premier of that province, Joey Smallwood. He was an effective and passionate cabinet minister and perhaps his reputation is best known as an opposition parliamentarian when the Liberal Party was defeated in 1958 and 1963. He was a member of the so-called four horsemen, or the original rat pack in the House of Commons, and I understand that he often sparred with Prime Minister John Diefenbaker.
It is with a great deal of respect that I offer my condolences today on behalf of the New Democratic Party to his widow, Margaret, and his family. He made a tremendous contribution to Canada and the House of Commons. As did Stanley Knowles, Jack Pickersgill really loved this place and all that was best about it. With that, I want to extend our condolences.