Donald Tansley

Donald Dougans Tansley (born  May 19, 1925 in Regina , †  July 19, 2007 in Ottawa ) was a Canadian civil servant and Red Cross official. He served as Deputy Minister of Industry and Finance for the Province of New Brunswick and later in the Canadian Government as Deputy Minister for Fisheries and Oceans under Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau . In 1975 he published a report called the "Tansley Report" on the state and future role of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement . For his work he was accepted into the Order of Canada and awarded the Henry Dunant Medal .

Life

Donald Tansley was born in Regina in 1925 and graduated from the University of Saskatchewan in 1950 after serving in the Regina Rifle Regiment of the Canadian Armed Forces during World War II . He then worked for the Saskatchewan Province government in the financial sector. In 1960 he became director of the provincial government's finance directorate, and two years later he became director of the Saskatchewan Medical Care Insurance Commission , which was responsible for building the national health insurance system in Saskatchewan. In 1964 he moved to the provincial government of New Brunswick , where he served as deputy minister of industry and finance under Prime Minister Louis Robichaud . Four years later, he became Vice President of the Canadian International Development Agency , the Canadian agency for international development and reconstruction aid.

Between 1973 and 1975 Donald Tansley headed a commission to investigate the state and future role of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement . The Commission's final report, published in 1975 under the title "An Agenda for the Red Cross" and often referred to as the "Tansley Report", contained a critical analysis of the relationship between the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the League of Red Cross Societies and the national Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies as well as various proposals for the organization of the future activities of the movement. Eric Martin , then President of the ICRC, described the Tansley Report as a "pitiless inquisition". Most of the Commission's proposals were implemented in the following decades, albeit with some delays.

Donald Tansley then took over under the Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau as head of the Anti-Inflation Board established in 1975 to combat rising prices and wages . After the underlying Anti-Inflation Act expired, he was Deputy Minister for Fisheries and Oceans in the Trudeau government until 1985. In 2005 he published his memories of his time as a soldier during the Second World War under the title “Growing Up and Going to War”. He died in Ottawa in 2007 as a result of lung cancer .

Awards

Donald Tansley was appointed a member of the Order of Canada in 1999 and in the same year received the Henry Dunant Medal , the highest distinction of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. The Canadian Red Cross, for which he volunteered, named him honorary vice president a year later.

Web links

• Gregory P. Marchildon: Tansley, Donald D. 1925-2007 In: The Encyclopedia of Saskatchewan (English, with picture)
• Red Cross mourns the loss of a great friend Obituary of the Canadian Red Cross (English, with picture)