Author: Hugh Segal

The Honourable Hugh Segal, current Chair of the NATO Council of Canada, is the the fifth Master of Massey College and has spent four decades in the public, private, academic and not-for-profit sectors. He is a former Chief of Staff to the Prime Minister in the 1990s, a former Associate Cabinet Secretary in Ontario in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, and in June, 2014, he finished a nine year term as Senator representing Ontario. Hugh is a graduate in Canadian History from the University of Ottawa, was a Senior Fellow at both the Queen’s School of Policy Studies and Business School where he taught at the graduate level. In the mid 1980’s, while in the private sector, he taught the Choice of Governing Instruments course at the University of Toronto Law school with Dr. Marsha Chandler, Professor Rob Prichard and the Hon. Donald Macdonald. Hugh’s work in the Senate included Chair of the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade, (which issued a major report on the reform of CIDA); The Special Senate Committee on Anti-Terrorism (which amended legislation to comply with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and High Court decisions and the review of new legislation prohibiting travelling abroad to engage in illegal terrorist activities); Vice-Chair of the sub-Committee on Poverty of the Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology (which issued the report In From the Margins a detailed study of urban poverty in Canada); and sitting as a member on the Senate National Security and Defense Committee. Hugh was the Canadian member of the Commonwealth Eminent Persons Group which addressed the need for reform and modernization of the Commonwealth and was subsequently appointed Canada’s Special Envoy to the Commonwealth. He acted as a fact-finder for the Minister of Foreign Affairs on issues relating to human rights, democracy and core values across the Commonwealth and specifically to rule of law issues in Sri Lanka in the lead-up to the Heads of Government meeting in November, 2013. While in the Senate, legislative proposals initiated by Hugh to protect the jobs of Canadian Forces’ Reservists deployed abroad and to impose quarterly financial reporting requirements for all federal government departments, agencies and Crown Corporations, were adopted and implemented by the Government. Hugh was a Skelton-Clark Fellow in the Queen’s Political Studies Department and holds Honorary Doctorates from his alma mater and the Royal Military College of Canada. He is an Honorary Captain of the Royal Canadian Navy, Chair of the Atlantic Council and Honorary. Chair of the Navy League of Canada. He is married to Donna Armstrong Segal who served in the Ontario public service in senior health policy and operations roles, and is a graduate of Queen’s University and the University of Western Ontario.