[2][3] His maternal grandfather, Alexander Taylor, was an emigrant from County Antrim in Northern Ireland who served as the police and fire chief and, in the last years of his life, justice of the peace for Transcona, during which time it was an independent community.

[5] Blaikie earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy and religious studies from the University of Winnipeg (1973), and a Master of Divinity from Emmanuel College, Toronto School of Theology (1977).

He was ordained as a minister in the United Church of Canada on June 4, 1978, and subsequently became a politician in the social gospel tradition of such figures as J. S. Woodsworth, Tommy Douglas and Stanley Knowles.

A new election was held in early 1980, in which the Liberal Party won a majority government under the leadership of Pierre Trudeau, who returned as Prime Minister of Canada.

[17][18] The Progressive Conservatives won a landslide majority government in the 1984 federal election under Brian Mulroney, defeating the Liberals under their new leader John Turner.

[21] In the same year, Blaikie brought forward a private member's bill calling for a three-year moratorium on the construction and export of nuclear power stations, to be followed by a national referendum on any further development.

He was also an opponent of Sunday shopping law reform in this period, arguing that it interfered with a community's right to determine common rest times.

[27] He also served as co-chairman of the NDP's international affairs committee, and held consultation meetings on whether or not the party should reaffirm its traditional opposition to Canadian membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

[29] He was retained as the NDP's External Affairs Critic after the Progressive Conservatives won a second consecutive majority government in the 1988 federal election, and was also chosen as his party's spokesman for federal–provincial relations and the Constitution.

[31] There were rumours that Blaikie would seek the federal New Democratic Party leadership after Ed Broadbent's resignation in 1989, but he declined to run and instead supported Simon de Jong, whom he described as having the greatest awareness of environmental issues.

[32] When de Jong was eliminated on the second ballot at a delegated convention, Blaikie moved to the camp of Audrey McLaughlin, the eventual winner.

[35] Blaikie's closest election came in 1993, when the Liberal Party under Jean Chrétien defeated the Progressive Conservatives under new leader Kim Campbell to win a majority government.

The New Democratic Party's support base had fallen in this period, due to unpopular decisions made by the provincial NDP governments of Bob Rae in Ontario and Michael Harcourt in British Columbia.

[36] In early 1994, Blaikie won unanimous support in the House of Commons for a Private Member's Bill calling for the government to officially recognize Canadians who served in the Dieppe Raid in World War II.

[42] He continued to hold these parliamentary roles after the 1997 election,[43] in which the Liberals won a second majority government and the NDP made a partial recovery to 21 seats.

[43][45] He played a key role in getting the NDP Caucus to support the Clarity Act in 2000, after securing amendments that were important to First Nations groups in Quebec.

[48] He expressed similar concerns about the Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) two years later, arguing that it put the rights of investors ahead of workers, environments, societies, and cultures.

[56] Blaikie was seen as a representative of the party's moderate left, fitting ideologically between the centrist Lorne Nystrom and the more left-wing Jack Layton.

He was supported by MPs Pat Martin, Judy Wasylycia-Leis, Bev Desjarlais, Wendy Lill, Yvon Godin and Dick Proctor, Manitoba Premier Gary Doer, New Democratic Party of Ontario leader Howard Hampton, and several former MPs including Simon de Jong, Dawn Black, Ian Waddell and Howard McCurdy.

[61] Paul Martin succeeded Jean Chrétien as leader of the Liberal Party in November 2003 and as Prime Minister of Canada in December 2003, called a new election for June 2004.

[68] He took part in another such committee in 1992, which issued a thirty-page report calling for more free votes, reforms to the parliamentary Question Period, and a streamlined process for passing legislation.

[72] When he left the House of Commons in September 2008, he wrote an editorial that criticized parliament's declining standards, referring specifically to a rise in "character assassination, simulated indignation, and trivial pursuit over substantial debate".

[74] In December 2008, Blakie announced that he would seek the NDP nomination for the provincial division of Elmwood, which had been vacated by Jim Maloway, Blaikie's own successor in the federal riding of Elmwood—Transcona.

[79] As Conservation Minister, Blaikie stewarded the development of five new provincial parks in Manitoba in 2011 and played a significant role in the government's attempts to protect the boreal forest on the east side of Lake Winnipeg.

[1] Blaikie was appointed to the Order of Canada in November 2020 "for his lifelong contributions to parliamentary service and for his steadfast commitment to progressive change and social activism.