This is the first occasion that a Joint Session of the Senate and House of Representatives has ever been held to pay tribute to one of our own.

Who better to establish this precedent than the Most Hon. Hugh Lawson Shearer who, in over half a century of public life, has served the people of Jamaica as labour leader par excellence, councillor, member of Parliament, Cabinet Minister and Prime Minister.

Since his passing, the many tributes from his colleagues, constituents, and a wide cross section of the Jamaican people have served to convey the true measure of the man, the height of his ideals, the breadth of his sympathy, the depth of his convictions and the length of his patience. In addition to these well-deserved encomiums, this supreme legislative body of our land has the responsibility to record for posterity, our appreciation of a colleague, a friend, an elder statesman and, above all, a fine human being.

May I remind this distinguished Chamber that this is not the first occasion on which the members of the Legislature have honoured this deserving son of Jamaica for his contribution to the nation. On May 15, 2001 at a special sitting of the House of Representative we paid tribute to him at the end of his illustrious career.

My task today is not to catalogue in detail the impressive list of accomplishment in his years of service, others have done so and many more will. Indeed the Government of Jamaica commissioned a biography which happily was completed prior to his passing and which met with his enthusiastic approval. I wish to indicate just a few of the unique aspects of his life which illustrate the characteristics that made him the exceptional individual that he was.

As we look back at our nation’s history we recognise that the failure of British colonial policy created the conditions that made 1938 inevitable. In three weeks of militant action, the working people brought the colonial administration to its knees and created the institutions which laid the foundations of modern Jamaica. History records the dominating presence of National Heroes Sir Alexander Bustamante and Norman Washington Manley.

Only the most discerning contemporary observers, would have taken notice of a seventeen-year old graduate of St. Simon’s College who, on his own initiative, went to Lynden Newland, a senior officer with the Bustamante Industrial Trade Union (BITU) and editor of the union’s newspaper the Jamaica Worker, to offer his services.

Newland, recognising talent, immediately invited the young man to join the staff of the BITU and assist him in producing the newspaper. Such were the circumstances in which Hugh Lawson Shearer began a half-century of public service.

This ambitious and focused young man was the product of a humble home in rural Jamaica. In an era when home, school and church worked in close partnership to inculcate the positive values and attitudes associated with the best of rural life – honesty, integrity and industry Hugh Shearer learnt these lessons well.

The Jamaica in which Shearer served his apprenticeship in the union movement was predominantly rural and poor. A commitment to raise living standards of workers could only mean long hours of explaining and winning consensus, facing the hostility of the employer class and the wrath of the colonial authorities.

The apprenticeship provided him with invaluable insights into the strengths and weaknesses of the people whom he would seek to represent, as well as with the oligarchy with which he would have to contend.

He learnt fast and he learnt well. The evidence was in the increasing responsibilities assigned to him by the “Chief”- Alexander Bustamante - whose tutelage prepared him for his role in transforming the Jamaican union landscape and the practice of industrial relations with his friend and rival, Michael Norman Manley.

It was their advocacy and negotiating skills that raised the status of the trade unions to that of the third point in the triangle of governance – the public sector, the private sector and the trade unions.

The enormous benefits he won for unionised workers are well documented. What needs to be given equal prominence is his insistence on discipline and integrity at the work place, making sure that workers honoured agreements negotiated with their employers.

He himself provided a shining example of this integrity and discipline he sought to inculcate as every employer knew that Hugh Shearer did not have to sign a written agreement. A handshake was enough. His word was his bond.

Shearer over the years had been an influential voice in the Executive of the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) the affiliate of the BITU which he led following Bustamante’s full involvement in government. But he was a reluctant participant in representational politics. Yet when in 1955 his party asked him to contest one of the most challenging seats in the Corporate Area – Western Kingston – he did not hesitate in coming to the wicket. Just over a decade later, at age 44, he became Jamaica’s youngest Prime Minister, having by then successfully pursued his electoral fortunes in South East Clarendon during the General Elections of 1967.

As Prime Minister, he presided over a period of exceptional growth in the Jamaican economy fuelled by major investments in bauxite and alumina as well as the tourism sector. The Act to create the National Insurance Scheme was one of the finest pieces of labour legislation ever to have come to this Honourable House and the programme since its inception has brought monumental benefits to the workers of Jamaica.

It was during his tenure that the award of Jamaican National Honours was initiated to replace previous British National Honours, which he referred to as an anachronism, commenting that he could not see how, at a time when there was no longer a British Empire, Jamaicans could be receiving such awards as “Knights of the British Empire and “Members of the British Empire”.

The firm proposal for a Caribbean Court as the final Appellate Body was conceived at a meeting of regional heads over which he presided in 1970.
As a Senator, he was Jamaica’s first voice in the international arena after independence when he was selected to deliver Jamaica’s policy addresses at the United Nations General Assembly. It was there he proposed that the world should identify an International Year for Human Rights. This was accepted, and the year 1968 so designated In every international forum he was uncompromising in his objection to apartheid. He mobilised support to fight this evil and inhumane system of racial injustice at the level of the Commonwealth, regionally in the Caribbean, and at the United Nations.

His consummate negotiating skills, honed in the trenches from the earliest days of his involvement in the union movement, of stood him in good stead as he led Jamaica’s international trade negotiations and when he returned to the Foreign Ministry during the 80’s. He soon won and retained to the end the esteem and regard of his foreign counterparts, being chosen as Chairman of the ACP group at critical stages of negotiations with Europe.

In this House, he was a formidable Debater. Not for him the flights of oratorical fancy, but grounded in the force of his convictions and his capacity of persuasive eloquence, his presentations always commanded deserving attention and due respect. He was at his most passionate when pleading the cause of the poor, and the disadvantaged.

He was a convincing advocate for all those who contributed to the service of Parliament – Clerks, Orderlies, Hansard Writers, and Drivers to Parliamentarians. He could change periods of legislative tensions into resounding peals of laughter by his timely humour and infectious smile. He was resolute and yet always gracious. He had no grudge to anyone and in return he earned the respect and admiration of all who served with him, on both sides of the aisle.

Throughout his entire career whether he worked on the stage of the union movement or in the corridors of political power he employed his considerable oratorical skills and persuasive powers in the cause of the rights of workers – a mission that was central to his life. However strong his views on any issue he had a gift for approaching every discussion or negotiation, however contentious, with an admirable level of courtesy, respect and camaraderie on both sides of the negotiating table and of the political fence. It is indisputable that he recognised that whatever our political views we were all united by a genuine wish to improve the quality of life of the Jamaican people.

Like all good leaders, he invested considerable time in nurturing the
next generation and many of the current leaders in the trade union movement are the beneficiaries of his mentorship.

It was no surprise to those of us who knew him well – as a man full of generosity of spirit and of time - that he ended as he began with a voluntary commitment in his later years to the welfare of a segment of the population - the elderly - whose cause he championed with characteristic dedication, care and concern.

As the nation prepares to pay its final respects to this man among men, we remember the words from Proverbs: “Good men must die, but death cannot kill their names.”