Thank you, Speaker—and I apologize; I was unable to be prompt with it. I do have visitors in the gallery today who I want to introduce to the House. David Ennis and Ian Sutcliffe are both students at the University of Windsor, and I’d like to welcome them here today. They’re experiencing the Ontario Legislature for the first time.

A little quick, aren’t I?

Interjection.

Our riding is composed of vibrant communities with rich character and unique identities, whether it’s residents who live in the neighbourhoods of Parkview, Riverdale, Red Hill, or former townships that still retain their identity, like Winona and Fruitland, we are united by strength of character and accomplishment.

Lincoln Alexander’s name was brought up a little bit earlier by the member across the aisle, and rightfully so. Lincoln Alexander, a McMaster grad, was a groundbreaking Hamiltonian and instrumental in Ontario’s history. I won’t go into the specifics that have already been covered off, and I won’t pretend that I knew Lincoln well, but I knew him well enough to spend time with him and learn to understand what he was about and who he represented. For decades he was a hero in Hamilton and thought of as one of the true champions, not only in Hamilton, but in Canada. Without question, he was revered—and a man who took the time to write personal notes to people and do things a little bit old school. Lincoln Alexander, along with my father, exemplified the statement that I’m going to read to you, and it’s really quick: “Civility is not a sign of weakness.”

In 2004, my son Jesse was awarded the Lincoln Alexander Community Award for service. We had lunch with him. My son understood before he even got to the lunch the impact that Lincoln would have on him, and after talking to him just the other day, he still remembers the lunch, remembers where we had it, and what we had in the conversation. Some people just make an impact and it lasts forever.

From waterfalls to industry leaders, Hamilton has it all. For decades, Hamilton has been known as a steel city. With our government investing $500 million, we are ensuring industry, as we always have been, with leaders like Dofasco, can continue to bring jobs and economic opportunity to our community while becoming world leaders in producing green steel. People in Hamilton work hard and play hard.

I have to talk about the Winona Peach Festival, which I attended this past weekend. The crowds were unbelievable; the organization was tremendous. If I served one sundae to the people, I must have served 2,000 peach sundaes. Not one complaint, they were happy to be back, and they were happy we were there to support such a huge part of our community. We will continue to after a two-year absence.

Of course, anyone who knows me knows a little bit of my background as it relates to football. What echoes in the halls of many buildings around Hamilton and area, as some will know, is the “Oskie wee wee” chant. Do you dare?

Interjection.

Interjection.

I put you on the spot; it’s okay.

I have to let everyone know on this coming Monday, the Labour Day Classic against the Argos will be played once again. I’ve been involved as a general manager and COO and as a player. It will be quite an event, and I will be there.

As I said, Hamilton has it all. From the agriculture sector, history, beautiful landscapes to an economic powerhouse, it’s a great place to live and it’s a great place to be on an ongoing basis.

I wouldn’t be standing here today without the support of—and I will reference them as “my team” when it came to the campaign. First, I would like to thank my campaign manager Blair Hains, who took me in, the rookie, and helped provide leadership and direction. I was surprised I got along with him so well, given that, on his off time, he’s an umpire in baseball. You know, umpires and officials—you’ve got to wonder.

From the time our campaign officially opened the doors, Blair kept things going, kept us going, and other than the ongoing reminding me what the polls might be saying and me reminding him, “I don’t care about polls. I care about June 2. Don’t talk to me about that. Let us run. We’re dogs. Let us go run”—he just stopped talking to me about polls, and it was great. He did a fantastic job. I owe him a real debt, because he was tremendous—and his family, by the way.

I’d also like to thank a long-time friend Jay Davison. I spent many hours with him on the phone. He’s a great confidant. He’s been involved in the party in many ways. He would actually drive down from Windsor three or four times and be part of my campaigning team going out with me. He was a little slow on the walking part of things, but he did a great job and really exemplified what a friend is all about.

I have got a few more thank yous. I’ll start with Scott Boumeester, chair of fundraising; Ken Audziss, the riding association president—he was tremendous; MP Dan Muys and his team; MPP Sam Oosterhoff and his team; Minister Monte McNaughton and the team he came down with; my core supporters, Gabe DeSantis, Jeff Paikin and Sergio Manchia.

And I have to mention a long-time friend, confidant, golfing partner. I know him as Eagle: Ron Foxcroft, and his sons, Steve, Dave and Ronnie. They were huge supporters. They were there whenever I needed them, no matter what, like all people who have been around this campaign have been to me. It’s been incredible.

Ministers Mulroney and Clark showed up at a fundraiser and helped us hit it out of the park. I mean, honestly, I couldn’t believe the support that we had and what we were able to accomplish as a result of that support.

My canvassers: Sarmad, some gal named Donna, Sara, Langdon, Gord, Brent, Peter, Beth, Barry, Scott, Patrick, Jenn—we were close to over—well, I think we were over 1,000 kilometres in total of what our team covered in walking and canvassing—incredible. The commitment that was made was incredible.

Thank you to my sign team. They were ready to go. They would show up and say, “Got more signs for us?” Jim, Todd, Dennis and William—hundreds and hundreds of signs went out thanks to them.

People on the phone: Marie, Mark and Dirk; and on election day, the drivers: Richard and Gary—simply put, we worked smarter, harder and longer than our competition, and as a result, we planted our flag firmly in the ground of Hamilton East–Stoney Creek.

This is when it gets hard for me, and maybe it will speed me up if I watch the clock. My wife, Donna, who has been a partner, has been through so much with me in our life experiences, professionally, personally. We have two fabulous kids I’ll touch on later. She looked at me when I made the decision and said, “Are you sure?” I said yes, and she said, “Let’s go.” I’m a real lucky guy and even luckier to have two wonderful kids: my son, Jesse, and daughter, Kristin. I’ll touch on them both a little bit later, in a couple of quick anecdotes.

When people think of the name Lumsden, often they think of—well, there’s a town of Lumsden in Scotland that some know of, but more, they automatically think of football, with a little bit of my career and my son’s career. But my family’s history in Hamilton goes back to 1875, when my great-grandfather and his two sons opened Lumsden Brothers wholesale food distributors in Hamilton. The company flourished over generations in Hamilton, relocating as the company grew. It started with deliveries by horse and buggy, believe or not, and then in the 1970s grew to expand to 42,000 square feet of warehouse. My dad was the president. At the same time he was president of the Gerling Global Life Insurance Co., and his brother Bill was the COO. They were involved with the company up until the late 1970s.

My mom, Trudy—Gertrude, but no one ever called her that—met my dad when he was down at Marquette University on a track scholarship back in the day, so I guess running comes naturally to us.

My sister, Martha Christine, was a pistol. She would push the limits. She was smart, and she probably had the same aggressive nature that I did. I wasn’t sure where it came from; my dad, not so much, but I think Mom had a lot to do with that for us, and it was all good—and her two sons, Jeff and Greg, and their families.

Lessons learned from the word “win,” or the letters W-I-N: The one thing that I learned early in my pro career, in about year 3 when I went to Edmonton, was to understand what sudden change or change was all about, and how to prepare for it. It may sound silly, but we would—and they still do, professional athletes, certainly in team sport—watch hundreds and hundreds of hours of video. But did we know how to watch them correctly? I didn’t, until I got to Edmonton.

Hugh Campbell was our leader and head coach. Joe Faragalli was our offensive coordinator. They taught us what to look for, how to predict. When things change in a split second in football, you have to be prepared, and it doesn’t just change one way. It has multiple opportunities in front of you, and if you haven’t studied, if you haven’t prepared, you don’t know how to deal with change.

Then I step back in my career in sport into a high school, Northern Secondary School in Toronto, in grade 10, playing football, playing hockey, running track and doing all the things. Our head coach was Clarke Pulford, and for anyone who has the history of the Toronto Maple Leafs, his younger brother was Bob Pulford, who had a great career with the Leafs back in the day when the Leafs won Stanley Cups.

One day I decided—a buddy said, “Hey, let’s skip practice and go do something.” I can’t remember what we did, but we skipped practice. We showed up the next day, and Coach Pulford grabbed me as I was leaving the locker room to go to practice and said, “Can I talk with you?” I said, “Yes, sir.” He said, “I don’t know why you missed practice yesterday, but you let them down. You didn’t let me down; you let your players down.” It wasn’t about my role on the team. It was about the team environment, the team chemistry and what “team” really means, and how you have to be able to look to your left and to your right and know they have the best interests of your success in mind when you play the game and when you practise. I had tears in my eyes. He didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t touch me. He just said, “I hope you learned your lesson”—and a lesson did I ever learn.

Six years later, at the University of Ottawa, we’re playing the University of Toronto at Varsity Stadium. That was the year we won a national championship, in 1975. We were a pretty good team. We were handing it to the Blues, and the game was over, and a woman came over and said, “Clarke would like to see you—Clarke Pulford.” I said, “Absolutely.” So I went over to the stands, along with a very good friend of mine, Terry West, who went to Northern with me. He said, “Great game. Congratulations. I love coming to the game when my boys are playing.”

What I didn’t know at the time is that as a result of diabetes, he had lost most of his sight, and a year later was going to lose half of his lower leg. When I walked away, I was talking to his wife, and I said, “How does he do it?” She said, “Oh, it’s simple. He hears the crowd, and I tell him, play by play, what’s going on. You’re his boys. He wants to know what’s going on. He supports you. He’s with you no matter what.” Now, think about that: a coach who was that invested in myself and Terry—and other guys, maybe, at the University of Toronto—to show up at games when he can’t even see the plays. Later on in life, not that long ago, that kind of commitment resonated with me to a good friend of mine.

I’ve had some great experiences, and I won’t bore you with all of them.

One of them, most recently—within the last maybe eight or nine years—was when I got a phone call to say, “Would you like to be part of Team Canada?” I said, “What’s Team Canada? Hockey? I got recruited? Finally. I’m going to be in the big time.” They said, “No, no, you knucklehead.” Arlene Dickinson, myself, Brian Burke and some other retired hockey players had been asked to go over and spend Thanksgiving with our troops. I said, “I’m in. I’m absolutely in.”

So we met in Ottawa. They got us to Ottawa. We flew to Ireland first, where the navy was going through their manoeuvres. We had Thanksgiving dinner with them on the ship, and it was fantastic. If you’re over 5 foot 5, you’re in big trouble on one of those battleships, because you’re walking around bent all the time. The bunks aren’t much larger; I don’t know how they do it. But these young people are smart, tough, resilient and committed.

Off in a plane we go to Kuwait, into the USA camp, where Camp Canada was. There we found a very energetic group of servicepeople who just couldn’t wait to play ball hockey with us. They had a ball hockey rink made with a roof on it, and it was only 42 degrees out—Celsius. That’s hot, and the sand is blowing.

Interjection.