Hon. Paula Simons: Honourable senators, I give notice that, two days hence:

I will call the attention of the Senate to the challenges and opportunities that Canadian municipalities face, and to the importance of understanding and redefining the relationships between Canada’s municipalities and the federal government.

Hon. Paula Simons: I am proud to rise today to say a few words about our dear colleague, Senator Judith Keating.

[English]

We had so little time to get to know Judith in person. Because of COVID restrictions, most of our friendships with her were forged over Zoom, Teams and telephones. My own relationship with her was very much shaped by the isolation of the COVID pandemic when we were all working from home and not rubbing shoulders here in the chamber.

But the woman and the senator that I came to know long-distance was such an inspiration. She had a dark and subversive sense of humour, and we bonded, if I can say so, over our shared love of irony and our shared impatience with hypocrisy. She was so smart, so serious, so no-nonsense in her work in the Senate. But privately she was wickedly funny and irreverent, and that was a side of her I really only got to know and see as we spoke and laughed via phone and video.

[Translation]

When we sat together on the Transport and Communications Committee, we would talk about issues that were important to her. She was deeply concerned about protecting and celebrating the French language in New Brunswick. We had many conversations about the future of the Broadcasting Act, and she fought hard to make changes to the legislation that would have ensured the future of French-language broadcasting in the province that was so dear to her.

[English]

We worked together on transportation issues, too. Senator Keating was particularly concerned about the future of air service in her province and about the plight of rural communities in New Brunswick that were cut off from bus service, too. Judith was also a vital part of our little gang of NAV CANADA agitators who lobbied together to Transport Canada to ensure that smaller Canadian airports didn’t lose their service and connections.

Her love for New Brunswick was the wellspring and the motivation of so many of the things she did. She loved the province with her whole heart.

When she first fell ill, I was touched and honoured that her office asked me to fill in for her on the Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs. It was a daunting task. Of course it was impossible for me, as a non-lawyer, to match in any way her extraordinary knowledge of the law and of constitutional affairs. But I was inspired by her example, and I tried my best to make her proud.

Few of us had the chance to get to know Judith Keating as well as we wanted to. I know I didn’t. We were all robbed of time we wanted to have with her, and we in the Senate were all robbed of her incisive intellect, wit, wisdom and profound legal knowledge. That makes our loss all the more poignant as we gather today to reflect on what might have been. May her memory forever be a blessing, and may she be bound up in the bond of eternal life.