Mr. Speaker, I rise to pay tribute to a former Speaker of the House, the late Alan Macnaughton.
Alan Macnaughton was born in Napanee, Ontario, in 1903. He graduated in law from McGill University and after post-graduate study at the London School of Economics he began practising law in Montreal. He was a crown prosecutor for many years. But more important for us, in 1949 he won his first of six consecutive elections as a Liberal. In fact, in the Diefenbaker sweep of 1958, he was so regarded by his constituents that he was the only English speaking Liberal to win a seat in Quebec.
After 1958, Mr. Diefenbaker decided to adopt the British practice of having an opposition member chair the public accounts committee. Alan Macnaughton was the first member of parliament who chaired that committee as an opposition member, which he did with great distinction.
When the Liberals won the 1963 general election, it was not surprising that he was appointed Speaker of the House of Commons. He served as Speaker during the Liberal minority government of 1963 to 1965, a very difficult and fractious period in the House. It was marked by such acrimonious debates as the famous flag debate. But Mr. Speaker Macnaughton was able to preside over these debates and these tensions with a great deal of skill, tact and diplomacy and was able to keep the House on an even keel.
One of his great achievements as Speaker was to start a wide- ranging process of parliamentary reform. Many of the things we take for granted in our procedures and our committee system, for example, were first developed and proposed during his speakership. Many of these reforms came into effect after he left the chair, but he was the precursor, the instigator.
In 1965, Alan Macnaughton did not stand again for parliament. His successor was none other than Pierre Elliott Trudeau. Alan Macnaughton went on to serve, again with great distinction, in the Senate of Canada to 1978. After he left the Senate, he was active in the business community, but most important, in 1967 he founded the Canadian branch of the World Wildlife Fund.
I want to conclude by saying that Alan Macnaughton was a person of great warmth and charm. He was especially helpful to new members of the House of Commons, as I once was. I had the honour of serving in the House with him. As an MP, as the first opposition chair of the public accounts committee and, above all, as Speaker, he treated everyone with the greatest tact and courtesy. But underneath it all was an essential firmness and a strong belief in the importance of the centrality of our parliamentary institutions. He certainly made an impressive mark when it came to the reform of the House of Commons.
I want to say to his family and his many friends that, on behalf of the government and all MPs on the government side, we want to express our profound sympathies on their loss.
I want to extend my most sincere sympathies to the family of Alan Macnaughton.
Alan Macnaughton was a great Montrealer, a great Quebecer, a great member of the House, a great Speaker and a great Canadian. His record will live on in the smooth functioning of the House because of the reforms he undertook and the work he did in his years as Speaker.