Mr. Speaker, I rise today to celebrate the upcoming 80th birthday of James Ross Hurley, the founding director of the Parliamentary Internship Programme.
In 1969, Mr. Hurley, a young academic at the University of Ottawa, worked with the Canadian Political Science Association and the late Alfred Hales, MP for Wellington, to develop a new program that would allow recent university graduates to serve as assistants to MPs and to study Parliament during a 10-month internship.
Thanks to Mr. Hurley's dedication, more than 500 Canadians have benefited from this unique non-partisan program, which continues to this day. The current interns will finish their placement this month. I, myself, am proud to have been an intern in 2010-11.
Mr. Hurley eventually moved on to a distinguished career with the Privy Council Office, but remains a dedicated supporter of the internship, most recently helping to establish the Hales and Hurley Parliamentary Foundation to raise funds on its behalf.
We congratulate him on this milestone and thank him for his contributions to Canada and our Parliament.