Genealogy Cannon is the son of government lawyer Louis Cannon and
Quebec television broadcast pioneer Rosemary "Posie" Power, and the grandson of
Lucien Cannon and
Charles Gavan Power. He is also the grand-nephew of
Lawrence Arthur Dumoulin Cannon, a long-time
Liberal politician and
Supreme Court judge. He is the great-grandson of
Sir Charles Fitzpatrick, defender of
Louis Riel and former Senior Minister in Laurier's cabinet. He is of Irish and
French Canadian descent. The extended Cannon family has had strong regional and national political influence in Canada for over a century and is considered to be influential as one of Canada's hereditary ruling class families, members having served in positions as lawyers, judges, Supreme Court judges, senators, ministers of defence, solicitors general, and members of parliament. They have had large influence in the national resource industries, as "barons" in the lumber industry particularly, as well as in broadcasting. The most famous member of the family was Cannon's maternal grandfather,
Charles "Chubby" Power, a confidante and
Minister of National Defence for Air in the
Cabinet of Prime Minister
Mackenzie King.
Early life Cannon grew up fluently
bilingual; his father was
francophone while his mother was
anglophone. He also grew up alongside his older brother, Françis Cannon. He was educated at
French speaking public junior and high schools. He graduated in
political science from the
Université de Montréal in 1971; and then worked for Liberal
Premier Robert Bourassa as correspondence secretary, leaving in 1976 for higher academic studies. Cannon received an
MBA from
Université Laval in 1979. He worked then in private sector as a financial analyst for
Société de développement industriel until 1981; and then as head of
Les Radiateurs Roy ltée from September 1981, to December 1985. Cannon has been a long-time member of the
Knights of Columbus.
Provincial political career Cannon then was elected in 1985 as a member of the
Quebec Liberal Party to the
National Assembly of Quebec for the provincial riding of
La Peltrie; and then served as Parliamentary Secretary: notably to the Minister of Foreign Trade and Technological Development, and then Tourism. From October 1990 to January 1994 he was minister for communications, and implemented the 911 emergency system as well as the Privacy Act within Quebec. He was also active with the
federal Liberals supporting
Sheila Copps (who as well later became
Deputy Prime Minister of Canada) in her attempt to win the federal
1990 Liberal leadership election won instead by
Jean Chrétien.
Private sector work Cannon worked in private industry as vice-president of
Unitel; now
AT&T Canada Corp. during the AT&T takeover of the Canadian firm; and in other concerns between 1994 and 2001 primarily in the field of information technologies. Cannon then remarried; and took an interest in Quebec local politics building a new constituency.
Constituency building in local politics Cannon was elected as
councillor for
Gatineau City Council in 2001, representing
Hull's
Val-Tétreau District, under mayor
Yves Ducharme. He served as president of the
Société de Transport de l'Outaouais from January 2002 to November 2005, while at the same time he was appointed president of the
Association du transport urbain du Québec. He had an especial sympathy for solving transport problems in Gatineau by road building rather than public transit approaches. During his mandate, the STO developed a BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) project called "
Rapibus", that has since been completed. His association and ownership of Groupe Cannon and Associates, a consulting company in telecommunications, has received little attention, and this ownership is expected to be put in a
blind trust as is usual in federal politics.
Foreign policy initiatives Cannon travelled extensively in Europe and the Americas both in and out of public life. In 2001, Cannon was appointed to the Board of the
World Commerce Institute, and then as president and general manager of AmeriContact for the
Quebec City Summit of the Americas in Quebec City.
Federal politics (left) and U.S. Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton in Montreal at an emergency relief summit on the
2010 Haiti earthquake Although Cannon and his family have historically supported the
federal Liberals, he switched to the
Conservative Party of Canada in the early 2000s. At the time, his switch to the Conservative Party raised eyebrows among the political class and the media, which generally attributed the move to his inability to make an impression with the Liberal Party. On September 16, 2005, he was named deputy chief of staff and deputy executive director of the Conservative Party. He was also named as
Quebec lieutenant to party leader
Stephen Harper. He successfully ran as a Conservative candidate in the riding of
Pontiac in the
2006 federal election, beating incumbent Liberal M.P.
David Smith. Winning with 33.68% of the vote, Cannon gained support from traditional Liberal voters. The Liberals had held the riding and its predecessors for all but nine years since 1935, and the Conservative candidate had finished a distant third in
2004 with 22.15% of the vote. On February 6, 2006, he was sworn in as
Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities. This portfolio includes
Transport Canada,
Infrastructure Canada, the Canadian Transportation Agency, the Transportation Appeal Tribunal of Canada and 16 Crown corporations. Many pundits had predicted that Cannon would also be named
Deputy Prime Minister of Canada, but Harper chose not to retain that office. However, Cannon was first on the list of ministers designated to fill in for Harper if he was unable to perform his duties, making him Deputy Prime Minister in practice if not in name. This was further emphasized when Cannon seconded the
pro forma bill to start the first session of the
39th Canadian Parliament; the bill is introduced before the House takes the
Speech from the Throne under consideration to maintain the right of the House to consider matters other than those directed to it by the crown. This bill is normally proposed by the Prime Minister and seconded by either the Deputy Prime Minister or the Government House Leader. Following the
2008 federal election, Cannon was appointed as
Minister of Foreign Affairs. Cannon was one of the higher-ranking
Red Tories in the Harper cabinet. In 2009, he denied diplomat
Richard Colvin's claim that Afghan prisoners transferred from the Canadian forces to the Afghan police were tortured. Cannon was defeated in the 2011 election by NDP challenger
Mathieu Ravignat, winning only 29.5 percent of the vote. His place as Minister of Foreign Affairs was taken by
John Baird.
Diplomatic post On May 10, 2012, Prime Minister Stephen Harper appointed Cannon as
Canadian Ambassador to France. ==Controversial remarks==