Honourable senators, I would like to take a few moments to remember my dear friend Joyce Fairbairn, who passed away on March 29. Journalist, trusted adviser and legislative assistant to Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, member of cabinet as Senate government leader, regional minister for Alberta, Minister with Special Responsibility for Literacy, chair of the Paralympic Foundation of Canada and honorary Kainai Chief of the Blackfoot Confederacy. These are just some of the highlights of a remarkable career.

In her own words, Joyce came to the Senate:

. . . to work . . . to provide a voice that connects Ottawa and Alberta, that connects their interests and tries to explain them to each other . . .

She believed that people truly mattered. Almost every weekend, even while in cabinet and even though her husband, Michael Gillan, lived in Ottawa, she would travel to her hometown of Lethbridge to meet with people and participate in local events.

Though an avowed Liberal partisan, she said:

. . . if you are working on the ground at the community level you are working with issues that concern not just one political party but everybody. . . . You park your partisan affiliation on the sidelines and get out and work on the issue.

It is fitting that the Lethbridge Conservative member of the House of Commons would refer to her warmly in public as “our senator” because that is who she was.

The people of Lethbridge mattered to Joyce. And because of her constant presence and attention, they knew it. Those people included the Indigenous community, to whose aspirations she was particularly sensitive.

Senator Fairbairn said:

If there is a black mark against this country, it is the treatment of aboriginal people . . . It is absolutely ridiculous to say that Canada was settled by two founding races. It was not. As my aboriginal friends will say, they had a very generous immigration policy.

One of Joyce’s proudest achievements in the Senate was successfully fighting for the establishment of the Standing Senate Committee on Aboriginal Peoples. She believed our chamber had:

a real role to play in providing a forum for wide ranging discussions on aboriginal concerns and the fundamental position of the aboriginal people in Canada today . . .

She was one of the founding members of that committee in 1989, and continued to serve on it for many years.

When, for health reasons, Joyce chose early retirement from the Senate in 2013, she was welcomed home by the people of southwestern Alberta. In 2015, she was invested into the Order of Canada, and in 2018, the Senator Joyce Fairbairn Middle School opened in Lethbridge, honouring her work in literacy and in her community.

Despite all her accomplishments throughout her life, what I will remember most is Joyce’s kindness because it is how we treat people that is remembered best.

Though we will all miss Joyce, she will be missed most by her niece, Patricia and her partner Martin, and her two great-nieces, Jessica and Natalie. They provided Joyce the safe refuge of family that all those in public life need, especially after her life partner died in 2002. To them I extend my sincerest condolences. Thank you.

Honourable senators, I rise today also to pay tribute to former senator Joyce Fairbairn, who passed away on March 29. I never had the pleasure of meeting Senator Fairbairn, but I am told that her diminutive stature did not take away from her very large presence.

Joyce Fairbairn began her career as a journalist with the Parliamentary Press Gallery and was subsequently hired as a legislative assistant in the office of Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau and became the Prime Minister’s communications coordinator.

She was appointed to the Senate in 1984 and later joined Prime Minister Chrétien’s cabinet, serving as government leader in the Senate from 1993 to 1997. Former senator Joyce Fairbairn was the first woman to serve as government leader in the Senate and the first minister with special responsibility for literacy. She also chaired the Standing Senate Committee on Agriculture and Forestry and the Special Senate Committee on Anti-terrorism.

I will leave it to colleagues who knew her personally to convey their special memories of Senator Fairbairn, but there is one story told to me by our former colleague Hugh Segal that I would like to put on the record.

In 1979, former prime minister John Diefenbaker, still an MP, was living alone in Ottawa. Joyce was legislative assistant to Prime Minister Trudeau and the country was in the midst of an election campaign. Mr. Diefenbaker’s health was failing and, while his housekeeper made sure his meals were ready, he complained to a staffer that he missed his regular lunch of “hot, hearty soup.” Joyce heard about this and the next day, she personally delivered a container of hot, hearty soup to Mr. Diefenbaker at his home in Rockcliffe. From that day forward, she made sure that soup was delivered to him most days of the week, and she personally made the delivery as often as possible. And they became friends.

When asked why she would extend this kindness to a former prime minister of the opposing party, she stated, “I sure didn’t vote for him, but he was still my prime minister.” Prime Minister Diefenbaker died a few weeks later.

I never met Senator Fairbairn but I know I would have liked her. I offer my sincere condolences to all of her family and friends.

Honourable senators, I have always been very fond of the Honourable Joyce Fairbairn, who was a long-time passionate and dedicated supporter of the Paralympic movement in Canada.

In 1998, in her role as a senator, she attended the Nagano Paralympic Winter Games. After learning that there may not be enough funds to send a Canadian team to the 2000 Paralympic Games in Sydney, she founded a group called Friends of the Paralympics to make sure that the team would be able to go.

This group became a game changer for elevating the paralympic movement in Canada. Shortly after the 2000 Paralympic Games in Sydney, Senator Fairbairn was instrumental in founding and becoming chair of the Paralympic Foundation of Canada, the first official charitable foundation connected to the Canadian Paralympic Committee.

I spent a lot of time with the Honourable Joyce Fairbairn at the Sydney Paralympic Games. I have fond memories of her gentleness, her charisma and her great kindness toward the entire Canadian team.

Honourable senators, let me share this quote from the president of the Canadian Paralympic Committee, Marc-André Fabien, who introduced me to his dear friend Senator Fairbairn. He said:

It is with extreme sadness that we have learned of the passing of Senator Joyce Fairbairn. She was a pillar of the Paralympic Movement in Canada for many years, including in critical years of growth, and her leadership, passion, and determination to strengthen Paralympic sport made a world of difference. . . . She will be greatly missed.

As I read this, I have images of myself warming up in a stadium somewhere in the world and spotting the biggest Canadian flag. Who was holding it? It was always her, looking great with a red Team Canada t-shirt, smiling and cheering very loudly in the stands. That is how I will remember Senator Joyce Fairbairn — an amazing woman who made a difference and a role model for the paralympic movement. May you rest in peace, dear Joyce. Meegwetch.

Honourable senators, four weeks to this day, my office received an email to say that after two glorious spring days, the snow came last night and whisked Joyce away.

I’m privileged to rise today to pay tribute to one of the most remarkable humans to grace this chamber, Senator Joyce Fairbairn, who, upon her death, was characterized by fellow Albertans as being inspiring, as being a powerful advocate, as being a builder and a trailblazer, as being a passionate, thoughtful and caring person.

The Canadian Paralympic Committee characterized her as “a pillar of the paralympic movement in Canada for many years.” They said she was “a pillar.” That is the perfect word to describe Joyce’s presence in this world.

I won’t reiterate the many accomplishments that she realized in her 50-year career. Instead, I want to celebrate and remember the kind and gentle person that she was. I only met her upon my appointment to the Senate and only had seven short years as a Senate colleague, but in that time I knew her to be tough, but fair, and always inclusive — a trusted colleague to every one of us, regardless of political affiliation.

I’m fortunate to have a member of my staff who was considered family by Joyce. As a result, I have had the privilege to see a side of her reserved to her closest circle. She had the biggest heart. Although she had no children of her own, she treated many as though they were hers. She loved animals and had an affinity for stray dogs and cats, as she couldn’t bear the idea that a living being was alone or unloved.

She felt the same about plants, and her beloved husband Mike was usually in support.

She was an amazing cook and loved to bake. Her cookies were treasured by many of us on this Hill. It was quite amazing for a lady who was so dedicated to her work to also be able to devote so much time to caring and supporting anyone who needed it.

Joyce was a decent and kind leader whose actions were rooted in who she was at heart. Her best skill was putting the focus on others. She was always at ease, be it in a meeting with top-level executives or in a Grade 4 classroom. At every interaction, regardless of who they were, she made sure that people felt exceptional and that their voices were heard.

I was elated to hear that a new middle school was named after her in the SunRidge area of Lethbridge, Senator Joyce Fairbairn Middle School. For generations to come, Albertans will learn of the amazing things she accomplished and she will continue to inspire Canadians for decades.

Following her retirement from the Senate, Joyce returned home to her stomping ground, as she so fondly referred to southern Alberta, from where she and three generations of her family before her hailed.

In her care home in Lethbridge where she lived for over eight years, Joyce was known in the early years for accompanying the caregivers on their rounds and during their breaks and giving those famous speeches throughout, always dressed in red, of course.

Later, she would follow them around in her wheelchair, paddling feverishly with her feet. Ever the Energizer Bunny was Joyce.

Her niece Patricia recounted to me that, when visiting her aunt, she would play Joyce’s favourite Frank Sinatra songs and that Joyce would sing or hum along happily. This connection to music continued throughout her last days.

Thank you, Senator Joyce, for your many years of public service and for the example you have set for those who follow in your footsteps. Canada is a better place thanks to you.

To paraphrase words of her glorious Frank Sinatra, she did it her way.

Thank you.

Honourable senators, I rise today to pay tribute to my dear friend and former colleague, Senator Joyce Fairbairn.

In thinking about what to say today, I first thought of the fact that Joyce was the first female Leader of the Government in the Senate. But she was so much more than that. She was a trailblazer for women in journalism and communications, culminating in a job in former prime minister Pierre Trudeau’s office.

She was a guide to me and others as chair of the Agriculture Committee and others. She brought out the best of us — and especially our clerks — in her Senate work.

She loved to ride horses. She was passionate about literacy and the Paralympic movement in Canada. She was a proud defender of the West.

What struck me the most was that she called herself the girl from Lethbridge, and the people of Lethbridge called her “our senator.” That’s right — in southern Alberta, a Liberal. That was a remarkable testament to how much people loved her and how much she loved and supported them, and all her fellow Albertans and Canadians.

While her career may have ended early, she remained steadfast in her work for as long as possible and she continued to live her life to the fullest. Our sincere condolences to her family and the many friends she leaves behind.

I find it fitting that it was her wish that the celebration of her life be held in the warmth of summer because that is who she always was in everything she did, warm and bright.

We will miss you, Joyce.

Honourable senators, I never knew Joyce Fairbairn but, as a fellow Albertan and a fellow journalist, I’m grateful for this opportunity to honour her memory.

Joyce Fairbairn was born on November 6, 1939, at the old Galt Hospital in Lethbridge. I mention that because the building is today the Galt Museum & Archives thanks, in part, to her vision and to the funding she secured for the project.

Her father, Lynden Eldon Fairbairn, was a pilot in the Royal Flying Corps during the First World War. He was later a Crown prosecutor, a judge and an active Liberal. Indeed, he sat as a Liberal candidate for Lethbridge in the 1935 and 1940 federal elections, which he lost to a Social Credit incumbent.

Lynden Fairbairn died in a riding accident in 1946, not long after Joyce’s sixth birthday, so she was raised primarily by her widowed mother Mary.

She landed her first job in journalism while she was still a high school student, writing a column for the Lethbridge Herald called “Teen Chatter.” She earned a BA in English literature at the University of Alberta in Edmonton and then headed to Ottawa to take a degree in journalism at Carleton University.

A true journalism pioneer, she was the first woman to be a member of the Ottawa press gallery where she worked until 1970 when she joined the staff of former prime minister Pierre Trudeau.

Others have spoken about her accomplishments as a political staffer and a senator, about her work as a champion of the Paralympic movement and of literacy charities.

Let me talk about the way Lethbridge will remember Morning Bird Woman as she was named by the Kainai First Nation when they inducted her as an honourary chief in 1990.

In Lethbridge, they remember Joyce Fairbairn as a politician who showed up to public events, parades and festivals, large and small; as someone who fiercely championed their city and region; as someone respected by politicians from across the political spectrum and from every order of government.

David Carpenter, who was mayor of Lethbridge from 1986 to 2001, spoke to the Lethbridge Herald after Joyce Fairbairn’s death.

I remember every year she used to do as many of the parades in the surrounding towns as humanly possible and then come back and smile all through the city’s Canada Day ceremonies. A ferocious speaker, never using notes, she could capture your attention even if you were one of a thousand listening.

David Carpenter added, “My biggest nightmare was to find out that I was scheduled to speak after her.”

In the end, Joyce Fairbairn’s memory failed her in the most treacherous and tragic of ways. But in Lethbridge, her memory will endure as a blessing for generations to come.

Honourable senators, I would ask that you rise and join me in a minute of silence.