Lloyd Francis, former Ottawa member of Parliament and Speaker of the House of Commons, has died of cancer at age 86.

In federal politics, Francis was notable for being alternately defeated and elected in successive elections between 1962 and 1984.

Lloyd Francis became Speaker of the House of Commons in 1984, after Jeanne Sauvé resigned to become governor general.Lloyd Francis became Speaker of the House of Commons in 1984, after Jeanne Sauvé resigned to become governor general.
(CBC)
He also served stints on Ottawa city council and as Canada's ambassador to Portugal.
 
Cyril Lloyd Francis was born in Ottawa on March 19, 1920. After studying at the University of Toronto, he worked briefly in Montreal before joining the Royal Canadian Air Force as a radar mechanic and air navigator.

After the Second World War, he did postgraduate studies at the University of Toronto and then at the University of Wisconsin, earning a PhD in economics.

He lectured for a few years at the University of Buffalo before returning to Ottawa to take a post as senior economist with National Health and Welfare in 1951.

He first entered politics in 1959, serving on Ottawa city council for several years before running for the Liberals in the riding of Carleton in the 1962 federal election. He was defeated that year and in 1972, 1979 and 1984, but won elections in 1963, 1968, 1974 and 1980, representing Carleton during his first term and Ottawa West during his next three.

Francis never served in cabinet, but did hold a number of other posts, including chief government whip and parliamentary secretary to the president of the Treasury Board.

He was named deputy speaker in 1980, and became Speaker in 1984 after Jeanne Sauvé resigned to become governor general.

After Francis's defeat in the election later that year, prime minister Brian Mulroney appointed him as Canadian ambassador to Portugal. He returned to Ottawa in 1987.

Francis was the father of three children, John Paul, Donald Lyle and Mary Elaine, and the longtime husband of their mother, Margery Elizabeth Miller, whom he married in 1943. In 1992, following her death, he married Mary Barbara Penner.