From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Paul Theodore Hellyer (born August 6, 1923) is a Canadian politician who has had a long and varied career in Canadian politics.
When he was first elected, as a Liberal in 1949, he was the youngest person ever elected to the Canadian House of Commons. After serving a brief stint as Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of Defence, and making a good impression, he was named Associate Minister of National Defence in the cabinet of Prime Minister Louis Saint-Laurent. This post was short lived though as Hellyer lost his seat when the St-Laurent government lost the 1957 election a few months later.
Hellyer was re-elected to parliament in a 1958 by-election and became an effective critic of the Diefenbaker government in opposition.
When the Liberals returned to power in 1963 Hellyer became full Minister of National Defence in the cabinet of Lester B. Pearson. This was the most notable point in Hellyer's career when he oversaw the complete realignment of the Canadian military into its present organization.
Hellyer contested the 1968 Liberal leadership convention losing to Pierre Trudeau. Hellyer served briefly as Trudeau's Transport Minister before resigning in 1969 over a dispute with Trudeau over funding for a housing program.
After sitting as an independent for several years and a failed attempt to form his own political party, the Action Canada Party, Progressive Conservative leader Robert Stanfield invited him to join the PC caucus. He rose back to prominence as an opposition critic but was unable to get re-elected as a Conservative.
Nonetheless, Hellyer contested the PC leadership convention of 1976, but his views were not palatable and he finished a distant sixth of eight contestants on the second ballot.
He rejoined the Liberal Party in 1982 but remained mostly silent in politics until he formed the Canadian Action Party in 1995 out of concern that both the Progressive Conservative and Liberal parties were embracing globalization and that the New Democratic Party had lost its relevence.
His party remained in obscurity and he lost bids for election in both 1997 and 2000.
Following the 2000 election and the resurgence of the NDP, Hellyer approached the NDP leadership to discuss the possibility of merging the two parties. This process was furthered by the passage of a unanimous motion at the CAP's convention in 2003.
In early 2004, after several extensions of the merger deadline, the NDP declined on the requirement that it change its name. Hellyer resigned as CAP leader and is considering running for the NDP in the upcoming election.
Hellyer has authored several books on Canada and globalization, as well as One Big Party: To Keep Canada Independent in which he promoted the merger of the CAP, NDP and various left-wing activists to save Canada from annexation by the United States via globalization.
