{"id":9602,"date":"2026-01-01T11:24:45","date_gmt":"2026-01-01T15:24:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/?p=9602"},"modified":"2026-01-01T11:24:45","modified_gmt":"2026-01-01T15:24:45","slug":"former-premier-darrell-dexter-among-order-of-nova-scotia-recipients","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/2026\/01\/01\/former-premier-darrell-dexter-among-order-of-nova-scotia-recipients\/","title":{"rendered":"Former premier Darrell Dexter among Order of Nova Scotia recipients"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_9605\" style=\"width: 1034px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-9605\" class=\"size-large wp-image-9605\" src=\"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/ONS-Insignia_resized-1024x576.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/ONS-Insignia_resized-1024x576.png 1024w, https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/ONS-Insignia_resized-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/ONS-Insignia_resized-1536x864.png 1536w, https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/ONS-Insignia_resized.png 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-9605\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Five people, including Darrell Dexter, have been appointed to the Order of Nova Scotia. (Office of the Lieutenant Governor)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Queens County&#8217;s Darrell Dexter is among five Nova Scotians given the highest honour in the province.<\/p>\n<p>Dexter has been appointed to the Order of Nova Scotia.<\/p>\n<p>He led the NDP to a historic provincial election win in 2009, forming Nova Scotia&#8217;s first New Democrat government.<\/p>\n<p>As premier, he led a government that tried to tackle the province&#8217;s debt and deficit, improve protections for private-sector trade union members, raise the minimum wage and lobbied successfully for the Churchill Falls hydroelectric project and a \u00a0multi-billion-dollar federal shipbuilding contract for Halifax-based Irving Shipbuilding.<\/p>\n<p>His government also bought the assets of the closed Bowater Mersey paper mill in Brooklyn in 2012. It was a deal that helped secure pension benefits for former Bowater workers.<\/p>\n<p>Dexter served as a Dartmouth city councillor from 1994 to 1996. He was an NDP MLA for the Dartmouth area from 1998 to 2013.<\/p>\n<p>A former lawyer, he is a graduate of Dalhousie University and the University of King&#8217;s College. He grew up in Milton. Since his resignation as NDP leader in 2013, after the party was defeated in that year&#8217;s election, he has worked as a political commentator and a lobbyist for the cannabis industry.<\/p>\n<p>He and his family have moved back to Queens County.<\/p>\n<p>Other recipients of the 2025 Order of Nova Scotia are:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>John George (Jack) Flemming, Halifax \u2013 a philanthropist and entrepreneur recognized for his contributions to local charities<\/li>\n<li>Rankin MacSween, Ironville, Cape Breton Regional Municipality \u2013 a business and community leader and from 1995 to 2021, president and CEO of New Dawn Enterprises, the oldest community development corporation in Canada<\/li>\n<li>Joel Plaskett, Dartmouth \u2013 a celebrated singer, songwriter, producer and philanthropist<\/li>\n<li>Carolyn G. Thomas, East Preston \u2013 an educator and human rights and community advocate; recognized for her contributions to education, government and community development.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>A ceremony will be held at Government House in Halifax in the spring. Lt.-Gov. Mike Savage will present the new members with their awards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Queens County&#8217;s Darrell Dexter is among five Nova Scotians given the highest honour in the province. Dexter has been appointed to the Order of Nova Scotia. He led the NDP to a historic provincial election win in 2009, forming Nova Scotia&#8217;s first New Democrat government. As premier, he led a government that tried to tackle [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,5],"tags":[3696,3691,3693,3695,3697,3698,39,3699,102,345,241,3692,49,3694],"class_list":["post-9602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community-news","category-news-posts","tag-carolyn-g-thomas","tag-darrell-dexter","tag-jack-flemming","tag-joel-plaskett","tag-john-george-jack-flemming","tag-lieutenant-governor","tag-liverpool","tag-mike-savage","tag-milton","tag-ndp","tag-nova-scotia","tag-order-of-nova-scotia","tag-queens-county","tag-rankin-macsween"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9602"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9602\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9606,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9602\/revisions\/9606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}