Mulroney honoured at state funeral in Montreal
Ruby Pratka
Local Journalism Initiative reporter & Montreal correspondent
editor@qctonline.com
As a contingent of RCMP officers in red serge dress uniforms bore former prime minister Brian Mulroney’s flag-draped coffin into Basilique Notre-Dame in downtown Montreal on March 23, the wind howled and a late-season snowstorm lashed the soldiers and police officers gathered in the vicinity of the church – a storm any Nord-Côtier would have felt right at home in.
“It’s perfect for Mr. Mulroney – he always loved winter!” Green Party Leader Elizabeth May quipped in front of the church.
May attended the ceremony alongside her four federal party counterparts – Prime Minister and Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, New Democratic Party Leader Jagmeet Singh and Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet. The premiers of all 10 provinces and three territories attended, as did several former prime ministers and premiers, Indigenous leaders, and many federal and provincial cabinet ministers and mayors, including Quebec City Mayor Bruno Marchand and Michel Desbiens, mayor of Mulroney’s native Baie-Comeau.
Politicians of all party affiliations stopped to briefly share Mulroney stories with reporters before hurrying into the church. Official Languages Minister Randy Boissonneault was a young tour guide at Parliament in 1990 when Mulroney, a vocal opponent of the apartheid regime in South Africa, was hosting Nelson Mandela. As Boissonneault recalled, Mulroney and Mandela were walking down a staircase when Mulroney spotted a camera in the young guide’s hands and said, “Make sure to take a good picture!”
For Boissonneault, Mulroney “was a great man … who wanted Canada to take its place in the world” and had a rare gift for creating consensus among different parties. “There’s less of that today, but it still exists,” he added. “We’re all in politics to fight for our ideas, but also to improve the country.”
Mulroney, who served as prime minister from 1984-1993, died in Florida on Feb. 29 at age 84. In the week leading up to his funeral, he briefly lay in state in Ottawa and at St. Patrick’s Basilica in Montreal before his casket was taken to Basilique Notre-Dame on the morning of his funeral. The ceremony itself was filled with references to Mulroney’s working-class roots in Baie-Comeau, his Irish heritage, his devotion to his family and his love of music. His daughter, Ontario cabinet minister Caroline Mulroney, who delivered the eulogy, said, “The prophet Isaiah said, ‘Consider the rock from which you are cut, the quarry from which you are dug.’ While my dad’s Irish heritage was the rock from which his character was cut, Baie-Comeau, Quebec, his hometown, was the quarry from which it was dug.”
Pierre-Karl Péladeau, CEO of Quebecor, for which Mulroney served as board chair until his death, also spoke at the funeral, as did hockey leg- end Wayne Gretzky and former Quebec premier Jean Charest. Tenor Marc Hervieux, who performed a breathtaking rendition of “Quand les hommes vivront d’amour” and harmonized with 18-year-old singer Elizabeth Theodora Lapham, Mulroney’s granddaughter, on “When Irish Eyes are Smiling,” was one of several musical luminaries who performed. A recording of Mulroney himself singing the Second World War-era song “We’ll Meet Again” was played during the recessional, at the former prime minister’s request.