Walter L. Gordon

Walter Lockhart Gordon (27 January 1906 – 21 March 1987) was a Canadian accountant, businessman, politician, and writer.

Education Born in Toronto, the son of Lieutenant-Colonel Harry Duncan Lockhart Gordon DSO, a prominent Toronto businessman, and Kathleen Cassels, daughter of the first President of the Exchequer Court of Canada Walter Cassels. Like his father, Gordon was educated at Upper Canada College and the Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston, Ontario.

Public affairs involvement in early business career Upon graduation and after a brief unhappy stint in New York, in January 1927 Gordon joined the accounting firm Clarkson, Gordon and Company, a prominent accountancy with roots to Upper Canada and the precursor to modern day EY Canada. The firm was at the time headed by Gordon's father (who became a name partner of the firm in 1913) and G.T. Clarkson, a grandson of the firm's founder Thomas Clarkson. He was a student there for four years, became a chartered accountant in early 1931. He and his wife were close friend with its editor Graham Spry, and other leading members of the League for Social Reconstruction, an organization of left-leaning intellectuals.

Gordon's time at Clarkson Gordon provided him with extensive exposure to government machinery. G.T. Clarkson was a close personal associate of Ontario Conservative Premier Howard Ferguson, and the firm was regularly retained by the Ontario government in the 1920s, so much so that Gordon commented that there were times when he seemed to spend more time at Queen's Park than he did in the firm's office. Through this committee he became friends with future Prime Minister Lester Pearson, then a young foreign service officer assigned to be commission secretary when the committee became a royal commission. Upon the completion of this prominent assignment, Gordon was promoted to be a partner of the firm in 1935. Gordon joined the department as a special assistant to Clifford Clark, the deputy minister of finance and one of the most influential Canadian public servants in the 20th century. Gordon's view of government was heavily influenced by Clark, Clark as Gordon saw Clark as "the dominating genius of the department and, in fact, of wartime Ottawa" and intellectually "the most exciting man" he had ever worked with.

In 1948, Gordon was retained by federal defence minister Brooke Claxton to help decentralize the defence department and improve its efficiency. In 1949, he was retained by the federal government to report on the structure of the National Film Board.

The beginnings of economic nationalism From 1955 to 1957, Gordon chaired the Royal Commission on Canada's Economic Prospects. The commission's reports, issued in 1956 and 1957, expressed concern about growing foreign ownership in the Canadian economy, particularly in the resource sector, and made recommendations to redress the problem. The themes raised in the reports were revisited by Gordon in his government career.

According to Dr. Stephen Azzi, Walter Gordon is responsible for "New Nationalism" in Canada. This is the idea of supporting stronger ties with Great Britain, to prevent Canada being absorbed by United States.

Political career In the 1962 federal election, he was elected to the House of Commons of Canada as a Liberal. He was Minister of Finance from 1963 to 1965, during Prime Minister Lester Pearson's first minority government. Gordon's 1965 budget, which included an 11% tax on construction materials and manufacturing equipment, as well as the expansion of social programs, was attacked by the Opposition parties. Gordon persuaded Pearson to call the 1965 federal election and co-chaired the Liberal campaign. When the election failed to return a Liberal majority, Gordon, taking responsibility for giving the prime minister poor advice, resigned from Cabinet and returned to the backbench. In 1967, he returned to Cabinet as President of the Privy Council from 1967 to 1968. He was noted for his economic nationalism and his support for new social programs.

Gordon disagreed, often sharply, with Pearson over the significant expansion in federal expenditures and the decline of sound financial management in Pearson's second administration, which began in 1965. The long friendship between the two men, which had begun in the mid-1930s, gradually unravelled. Canadian historian Jack Granatstein argues in Yankee Go Home? that the CIC "helped to create the atmosphere in which Trudeau's government established the Canada Development Corporation in 1971 to 'buy back' Canada."

Electoral record