Robert Gordon Robertson

Robert Gordon Robertson
7th Commissioner of the Northwest Territories
In office November 15, 1953 – July 12, 1963
Monarch	Elizabeth II
Preceded by	Hugh Andrew Young
Succeeded by	Bent Gestur Sivertz
Personal details
Born	May 19, 1917 (1917-05-19) Davidson, Saskatchewan, Canada
Religion	United Church of Canada

Robert Gordon Robertson, PC, CC, FRSC (born May 19, 1917) was Commissioner of the Northwest Territories from November 15, 1953 to July 12, 1963 who, having been sworn in at the age of 36, remains the youngest person to ever hold the office. [1] He went on to become Clerk of the Privy Council and Secretary to the Cabinet, the top position in the Canadian public service.

Born in Davidson, Saskatchewan, Robertson was educated at University of Saskatchewan, University of Oxford (where he was a Rhodes Scholar) and University of Toronto. He joined the Department of External Affairs in 1941. From 1945 to 1948 he worked in the Prime Minister's Office of William Lyon Mackenzie King, and from 1948 to 1953 he was in the Privy Council Office under Prime Minister Louis St. Laurent. In 1953 he was appointed Deputy Minister of the newly formed Department of Northern Affairs and National Resources. By virtue of that position he was also Commissioner of the Northwest Territories. He remained in this combination of positions until 1963, when incoming Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson appointed him Clerk of the Privy Council and Secretary to the Cabinet, the top position in the Canadian public service. He held this position under Pearson and then under Pierre Elliott Trudeau until 1975. In that year, Trudeau appointed him Secretary to the Cabinet for Federal-Provincial Relations, to support Trudeau in his constitutional reform agenda. He remained in that position for most of the government of Joe Clark, retiring in December 1979.

In 1970, he won the Vanier Medal of the Institute of Public Administration of Canada.

In 1976 he was made a Companion of the Order of Canada.

Robertson served as Chancellor of Carleton University in Ottawa from 1980 to 1990.

In 2000, Robertson published "Memoirs of a Very Civil Servant", which recounted his experiences as a senior civil servant under five Canadian Prime Ministers.

As of 2010, Robertson is the oldest living former head of a Canadian Province/Territory.

References

• Gordon Robertson. 2000. Memoirs of a Very Civil Servant: Mackenzie King to Pierre Trudeau. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
• Clerk of the Privy Council

Academic offices
Preceded by Gerhard Herzberg	Chancellor of Carleton University 1980–1990	Succeeded by Pauline Jewett