It has been one year since I started this SubStack. The idea began shortly after I lost the election in 2019. I had blogged before, starting somewhere around 2001, and stopped when I started working for politicians, long before thinking of running myself. After I lost, I realised I had over 20 years of material between my blog, newspaper columns, interviews, and ultimately my records in Hansard, with over 400 interventions in the House and over 3,000 in public sessions of committees.
My intention, originally, was to turn it all into a book, with the working title “No Box In Which To Think”, interspersing the personal story of how I got into politics and why, with what happened in office, how it really works, what I hoped to achieve, and ultimately where I see the country going.
I was never a cabinet minister and generally avoided controversy and the public eye outside of my own riding of Laurentides—Labelle, the rural region where I grew up, ran, and represented. As past, and future, essays here will show, this does not mean I steer away from controversial topics or unconventional or unpopular opinions. There is, alas, no box in which I am completely comfortable thinking. It also means, however, that finding a publisher in this day and age is rather more challenging.
After completing a draft and still not having found anyone to take it on, and refusing to self-publish a printed book, I realised that what mattered to me most is the sharing of the stories within it. My objective was to peel back the mystique of public life and help anyone interested see both what it’s really like, and that, as I like to say, “politicians are people too.”
When I was first elected, I would often comment on the Hill that if anyone were ever to notice that I was there, I would no doubt be kicked off the property.
I resented the protocol of non-partisan staff refusing to call me anything other than Mr Graham, and identified far better with political staffers, security guards, interpreters, photographers, and so many other support staff than I did with most of my colleagues, and bonded precious little with the many journalists floating around looking for a pithy quote to be taken out of context.
That takes us back to this SubStack. I created it as an outlet to share these stories with you, to mix the personal and the professional, the story and the perspective, and to participate in the wider conversation about who and what we are and want to be, as one of many voices.
I want to thank the over 200 of you who routinely read these essays for coming along for the ride, for subscribing and sharing, participating, and for offering your own perspectives, often through thoughtful private responses.
It is, without a doubt, easier to share an important idea with the world here than it ever was in the Chamber of the House of Commons, and I look forward to continuing this adventure together with you.