Early life and career

Joseph Jean-Pierre Marc Garneau was born on February 23, 1949, in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. He attended primary and secondary schools in Quebec City and Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu. He received a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering Physics from the Royal Military College of Canada in 1970, and in 1973 received a Doctorate in Electrical Engineering from the Imperial College of Science and Technology in London, England. From 1982 to 1983, he attended the Canadian Forces College in Toronto.

Career in the Navy

In 1974, Garneau began his career in the Royal Canadian Navy as a Navy combat systems engineer on HMCS Algonquin. He was promoted to Commander in 1982 while at Staff College and was transferred to Ottawa in 1983. In January 1986, he was promoted to Captain and retired from the Navy in 1989.

Career with the Canadian Space Agency

Garneau was one of the first Canadian Astronauts and he became the first Canadian in outer space in October 1984. In 1984, he was seconded to the new Canadian Astronaut Program (CAP), one of six chosen from over 4,000 applicants. He flew on the shuttle Challenger, STS-41-G from October 5 to 13, 1984, as payload specialist. He was promoted to Captain in 1986, and left the Navy in 1989, to become deputy director of the CAP. In 1992-93, he underwent further training to become a mission specialist. He worked as CAPCOM for a number of shuttle flights and was on two further flights himself: STS-77 (May 19 to 29, 1996) and STS-97 (to the ISS, November 30 to December 11, 2000). He has logged over 677 hours in space.

In February 2001, he was appointed executive vice-president of the Canadian Space Agency, and became its president on November 22, 2001.

Political career

Garneau resigned as President of the Canadian Space Agency to run for the Liberal Party of Canada in the 2006 federal election in the riding of Vaudreuil-Soulanges, which was represented by Meili Faille of the Bloc Québécois. The Liberal Party's support dropped off considerably in Quebec after the Sponsorship scandal and though considered a star candidate Garneau lost to Faille by over nine thousand votes.

In the 2006 Liberal Party leadership election Garneau announced his support for perceived front-runner Michael Ignatieff, who lost to Stéphane Dion on the final ballot. With the resignation of Liberal MP Jean Lapierre in 2007, Garneau expressed interest in being the party's candidate in Lapierre's former riding of Outremont. Dion instead appointed Jocelyn Coulon as the party's candidate, who went on to be defeated by the New Democratic Party's Thomas Mulcair in the by-election.

In May 2007, Garneau filed nomination papers to be the party's candidate in Westmount—Ville-Marie, after former Liberal Party Deputy Leader Lucienne Robillard announced she would not be seeking re-election. However, a week after filing his nomination papers Dion announced that he had hand-picked a candidate for the riding. Garneau later withdrew his nomination papers and announced he no longer had an interest in politics. In October 2007, Garneau and Dion held a joint news conference where they announced that Garneau would be the Liberal Party candidate in Westmount—Ville-Marie. Robillard announced her resignation as Member of Parliament in January and a by-election was later scheduled for September 8, 2008. However, the by-election was cancelled during the campaign when Prime Minister Stephen Harper called a general election for October 14, 2008. Though some pundits predicted a close race between Garneau and NDP candidate Anne Lagacé-Dowson, Garneau went on to win the riding by over 9,000 votes.

Garneau was narrowly re-elected in the 2011 election where he beat New Democratic Party candidate Joanne Corbeil. He was Liberal House Leader and served as Liberal Foreign affairs Critic. He was a candidate for interim leadership of the Liberal Party, but was ultimately defeated by Bob Rae. Garneau announced later that year that he was considering a bid for the permanent leadership of the party. In the summer of 2012, he announced that he was looking for a "dream team" to run his leadership bid and that he would only run if he could find the right people.

On November 21, 2012, Garneau was named his party's Natural Resources critic after David McGuinty resigned the post. On January 30, 2013, Garneau was replaced as Natural Resources critic by Ted Hsu. Garneau had been serving in the position on an interim basis

On September 18, 2013, Garneau was named co-chair of the Liberal International Affairs Council of Advisors, providing advice on foreign and defence issues to Liberal Party of Canada leader Justin Trudeau.

In the 2015 elections held on October 19, 2015, Garneau was re-elected in the newly created riding of Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount. Two weeks later, on November 4, 2015, Garneau was appointed Transport Minister of Canada in the federal Cabinet headed by Justin Trudeau.

Leadership

See also: Liberal Party of Canada leadership election, 2013

On November 28, 2012, Garneau announced his bid for the leadership of the Liberal Party, placing a heavy focus on the economy. While fellow leadership candidate Justin Trudeau was widely seen as the frontrunner in the race, Garneau was thought to be his main challenger among the candidates. With his entrance into the leadership race he resigned his post as Liberal House Leader, while remaining the party's critic for Natural Resources.

At the press conference announcing his candidacy Garneau ruled out any form of co-operation with the Green Party or New Democratic Party to help defeat the Conservative Party in the next election, which was proposed by leadership candidate Joyce Murray.

On 13 March 2013 Garneau announced his withdrawal from the race, and threw his support to front-runner Justin Trudeau.

Awards and honours

Garneau was appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada in 1984 in recognition of his role as the first Canadian astronaut. He was promoted the rank of Companion within the order in 2003 for his extensive work with Canada's space program.

He was awarded the Canadian Forces Decoration for 12 years of honourable service with the Canadian Forces.

He is honoured with a high school named after him, Marc Garneau Collegiate Institute in Toronto and É.S.P. Marc-Garneau in Trenton, Ontario.

Garneau is the Honorary Captain of the Royal Canadian Sea Cadets. In addition, no 599 Royal Canadian Air Cadets squadron is named in his honour.

Garneau was awarded the Key to the City of Ottawa from Marion Dewar the Mayor of Ottawa on 10 December 1984.

Honorary degrees

Province	Date	School	Degree
Ontario	1985	Royal Military College of Canada
Nova Scotia	1985	Technical University of Nova Scotia	Doctor of Engineering (D.Eng)
Quebec	1985	Laval University
Quebec	1990	Royal Military College Saint-Jean
Ontario	1997	University of Ottawa	Doctor of the University (D.Univ)
Alberta	Spring 2001	University of Lethbridge	Doctor of Science (D.Sc)
Ontario	Spring 2002	York University	Doctor of Science (D.Sc)
Quebec	December 2004	Concordia University	Doctor of Laws (LL.D)
Ontario	November 2005	McMaster University	Doctor of Science (D.Sc)
Alberta	2006	Athabasca University	Doctor of Science (D.Sc)
British Columbia	2006	British Columbia Institute of Technology	Doctor of Technology (D.Tech)

This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.

Electoral record

Canadian federal election, 2015: Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Westmount
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%	Expenditures
	Liberal	Marc Garneau	29,755	57.67	+19.43	-
	New Democratic	James Hughes	11,229	21.76	-13.29	-
	Conservative	Richard Sagala	7,414	14.37	-3.28	-
	Green	Melissa Kate Wheeler	1,581	3.06	-1.32	-
	Bloc Québécois	Simon Quesnel	1,282	2.48	-1.59	-
	Marxist-Leninist	Rachel Hoffman	181	0.35	-	-
	Independent	Lisa Julie Cahn	151	0.29	-	-
Total valid votes/Expense limit			51,593	100.00	-	$214,383.86
Total rejected ballots			311	0.60	-	-
Turnout			51,904	65.21	-	-
Eligible voters			79,597	-	-	-
	Liberal notional hold		Swing		+16.36
Source: Elections Canada

Canadian federal election, 2011: Westmount—Ville-Marie
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%	Expenditures
	Liberal	Marc Garneau	15,346	37.18	-9.29	-
	New Democratic	Joanne Corbeil	14,704	35.62	+12.69	-
	Conservative	Neil Drabkin	7,218	17.49	+1.68	-
	Bloc Québécois	Véronique Roy	2,278	5.52	-1.74	-
	Green	Andrew Carkner	1,516	3.67	-3.37	-
	Rhinoceros	Victoria Haliburton	140	0.34	+0.18	-
	Communist	Bill Sloan	73	0.18	+0.09	-
Total valid votes/Expense limit			41,275	100.00		-
Total rejected ballots			165	0.40
Turnout			41,440	53.76
Electors on the lists			77,084
	Liberal hold		Swing		-10.99

Canadian federal election, 2008: Westmount—Ville-Marie
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%	Expenditures
	Liberal	Marc Garneau	18,041	46.47	+0.79	$78,009
	New Democratic	Anne Lagacé Dowson	8,904	22.93	+7.56	$79,186
	Conservative	Guy Dufort	6,139	15.81	-1.84	$34,968
	Bloc Québécois	Charles Larivée	2,818	7.26	-5.30	$8,281
	Green	Claude William Genest	2,733	7.04	-1.31	-
	Rhinoceros	Judith Vienneau	62	0.16	-	-
	Marxist-Leninist	Linda Sullivan	49	0.13	-0.10	-
	Independent	David Rovins	47	0.12	-	$30
	Communist	Bill Sloan	34	0.09	-0.08	$2,433
Total valid votes/Expense limit			38,827	100.00		$83,153
Total rejected ballots			224	0.57
Turnout			39,051	50.64
Eligible voters			77,112
	Liberal hold		Swing		+1.34

Canadian federal election, 2006: Vaudreuil—Soulanges
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	∆%	Expenditures
	Bloc Québécois	Meili Faille	27,012	43.16	-1.13	$85,133
	Liberal	Marc Garneau	17,768	28.39	-10.41	$79,413
	Conservative	Stephane Bourgon	11,889	19.00	+10.81	$35,090
	New Democratic	Bert Markgraf	3,468	5.54	+1.64	$3,385
	Green	Pierre Pariseau-Legault	2,450	3.91	+0.14	$1,144
Total valid votes/Expense limit			62,587	100.00	$85,543
	Bloc Québécois hold		Swing		+9.28

[ Source: Wikipedia ]