Former Quebec Premier Jean Charest was among the eulogists at the state funeral for Prime Minister Brian Mulroney on March 23, 2024.

Here is the full text of his remembrance:

Over the last few days, Canadians have had an opportunity to better know the Mulroney family.

We better understand why Brian Mulroney was so devoted to his wife Mila, his children Caroline, Ben, Mark, Nicolas and their families.

We offer you our sincere condolences.

In preparing my eulogy, I remembered an African proverb according to which every child’s birth is part of a story.

Brian Mulroney’s story is about his Irish roots, about Baie-Comeau and the North Shore, about Québec and the unfinished building of Canada.

These stories determine the course of his life.

They explain the love he felt for his family and the ambitions he nurtured for his country.

Brian Mulroney lived and breathed politics.

Throughout his studies in New Brunswick, in Quebec and in Nova-Scotia at St-Francis Xavier University and Laval University, politics is always there, in the background.

Through politics, he built relationships, established friendships, and came to acquire a deep knowledge of his country.

His career as a lawyer in Montreal was a launching pad for his professional and political career.

It’s here that Brian met Mila, the love of his life.

He confided in me, when he appointed me to cabinet, that he wouldn’t have become Prime Minister of Canada had it not been for the support and love of his wife.

Elected leader of the Progressive conservative party in 1983, Brian Mulroney challenged its members, instilling discipline, and getting it ready to govern.

He won two commanding majority victories.

He was Prime Minister, and he would make it count.

The Brian Mulroney that we saw from caucus and cabinet was, as in Theodore Roosevelt’s famous speech of 1910, “The man in the arena”.

Like that man, he was no timid soul that had never known victory nor defeat.

Brian Mulroney chose to spend his political capital.

He took risks, and by doing so, became one of those rarest of leaders, able to define an era as his own.

He would remind us in caucus and cabinet that the number one task of any Prime Minister was to keep the country united.

In 1984, national unity meant that we needed to heal the wounds of the past and initiate constitutional reforms to bring us together.

The second most important task of a Prime Minister was managing Canada’s relationship with our neighbours, friends, allies and in particular with our most important economic partner, the United States.

And so, he dared to defy history itself and negotiated a free trade agreement with the Americans.

To get this done, he was subjected to the test of a grueling and punishing election campaign.

To win in 1988, he brought together Albertans and Quebecers in support of free trade.

He did so because he knew that, to build a great nation, the bridges between West and East, French and English, newcomers to Canada and the native-born, could not and could never be taken for granted.

His majority mandates from Canadians were about change.

Canada’s economy was in dire need of a conservative overhaul.

So, there would be fiscal reform and the GST.

I can’t think of a more unpopular economic policy than the implementation of the GST.

And yet I can’t think of a more popular economic policy with all the subsequent Prime Ministers and governments that followed in the footsteps of Brian Mulroney.

And he would do more…

Privatizations. Deregulation. Expenditure reduction.

His government would dismantle the National Energy program in the West and sign the Atlantic Accord in the East.

He concluded the largest land claims agreement in Canadian history and created the Territory of Nunavut.

One of the greatest challenges of our times is the issue of the Environment.

For our generation, pollution, climate change and the energy transition are existential issues.

In 2006, commentators were in disbelief when Brian Mulroney – a Conservative! – was given the title of Canada’s greenest Prime Minister.

We were among the first countries in the world to launch a Green Plan.

Before being elected as Prime minister, Brian Mulroney made the issue of acid rain the priority in our relationship with the United States.

In 1991, he teamed up with George Bush senior and negotiated an agreement.

It is regarded today as one of the world’s most successful environmental treaties.

But not the only one.

In 1987, his government also negotiated the Montreal Protocol.

I was with him at the Rio summit in 1992 when Canada would be the first G7 country to sign the Convention on Climate Change and the Convention on biodiversity.

More that 40 years ago, Brian Mulroney understood that it was his generation’s — and Canada’s — responsibility to protect the environment for the sake of generations to come.

One of Brian Mulroney’s first major achievements in the international politics sphere was introducing Quebec to the Francophonie by negotiating the creation of the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie (OIF) with Quebec Premier Pierre-Marc Johnson and French President François Mitterrand.

On the international stage, Brian Mulroney walked amongst the giants of the world:

Reagan, Bush, Thatcher, Mitterrand, Kohl, Nakasone, Abdou Diouf, Gorbachev and others.

Canada won a seat on the United Nations Security Council.

We embraced peacekeeping.

In 1991, Canada went to war, and we fought next to our allies in the Gulf.

We played a crucial role as the Berlin wall fell and a new world, including a new Europe, dawned.

We were the first western nation to recognize a free and proud Ukraine.

And in one of his greatest moments, Brian Mulroney united all Canadians with pride and resolve, as he and our nation helped Nelson Mandela take that first walk to freedom.

His international contributions didn’t end when he left office.

He continued to offer invaluable advice and support to his successors.

In the last weeks of his life, he entered the arena a final time, defending Israel and fighting anti-Semitism in a compelling speech he delivered in New York.

Every Wednesday, the parliamentary group of his party gathered for a national caucus.

We all looked forward to the moment where our Leader would speak.

It was just us and him.

He would review the political events of the past week.

He would brief us about his upcoming meetings.

He would share and sometimes reveal what was most intimate to him: his hopes, his joys and his disappointments.

He knew how to make us laugh and how to make us cry.

He told us about his family, his ambitions, his plans and his vision for our country.

He would never miss an opportunity to remind us that he had faith in us and that he loved us.

The dark clouds of all the bad polls would dissipate and the sun would reappear.

The Right Honourable Brian Mulroney treated his political opponents with respect. He did not view them as enemies. They were opponents, but more importantly, they were also Canadian patriots.

Brian Mulroney had, as was said about his hero Thomas D’Arcy McGee, “a heart made for friendship”.

Much has been said and reported about how Brian Mulroney would reach out to other people.

I will predict this:

We will not have enough of our lifetime to hear all the stories about when he reached out to friends, opponents, and people he had never met.

He wanted to share with them what he knew to be true.

That whatever the circumstances, things would come to pass.

And, as they strived to reach that day, they were not alone and that they could count on his support and his friendship.

For all of us who served under him, MP’s ministers, political staff, organizers and public servants, there was no other place we would have wanted to be.

Here… Now… At this very moment, we live in a world that he helped shape.

We live in the country that he worked so hard to build.

We live in Canada, the best country in the world.

So, on this day, Canadians pay their respects, and express their deep gratitude to one of Canada’s greatest Prime Ministers and one of Canada’s greatest nation builders: Brian Mulroney.