During his career as a senator Idwal Wyn [Walwyn] Hughes had a reputation for finding the bugs in government legislation, which is perhaps fitting since he is an entomologist (insect expert) by training.Senator Dr Hughes recently retired after 15 years as a senator and nearly 60 years of service to government, in the environmental and financial sectors. The Royal Gazette met with Dr Hughes to reflect on his long career.There were no guns or bombs, but Bermuda was at war when Dr Hughes first took up a post in the Department of Agriculture. The year was 1954 and the Bermuda landscape was covered with the skeletal remains of a dead cedar forest.“It was a depressing time,” said Dr Hughes. “One minute we had these magnificent cedar forests, the next minute these insects got in in the early 1940s. By the end of that decade the Island was devastated. Hundreds of thousands of trees were dead. There were just the grey remains everywhere. There was a major campaign to try to combat that. I went to work for the department as a lab technician.”He came under the influence of a Florida entomologist, Dr Fred Bennett who has written a number of books on insect pests in the Caribbean and other parts of the world. Dr Hughes became so fascinated by insects, that he went on to obtain a doctoral degree in entomology from the University of Florida. After finishing his education he became the entomologist and plant pathologist with the Department of Agriculture and worked his way up to Director of Agriculture in Bermuda between 1975 and 1985.“I was always interested in agriculture and I wanted to be a farmer but there wasn’t much opportunity for farming in Bermuda,” said Dr Hughes. “Then I became caught up in the battle to save the cedar trees. We learned a lot of lessons from that disaster. We probably learned that a monoculture like the cedars was always a risky thing to have. Until the 1940s 95 percent of the plants in the forest were cedars. Now you have quite a diverse flora. We also learned about the need to control the importation of plants as the pests that attacked the cedar trees were brought in on imported plant material.”During his career, he has been passionate about preserving the environment by protecting arable land and open spaces, and acquiring more open space for the community.“I got sidetracked into bureaucracy,” said Dr Hughes. “When I left Agriculture I was Permanent Secretary of the Environment for three years. After that I became the Financial Secretary for seven years. That was quite a career change from science to finance.”Dr Hughes said along the way he did miss entomology. He could have easily become a entomology researcher, but that would have required him leaving the Island. To this day he carries a hand lens for the quick magnification of pests in his pocket.“People more often ask me what is wrong with my avocado tree or my citrus tree than they do ask me about the economy,” said Dr Hughes. “Those things run deep because I was in agriculture so long. It is probably simpler to advise on insects.”He retired from the civil service in 1994 and two years later was appointed to the senate as an independent senator.“It was an interesting challenge,” he said. “I enjoyed it. It was a rather unusual role. There were three independent senators out of 11 senators. I interpreted our role as to reflect our own conscience and what we think the public view is and to speak to that. This means you are supportive of a bill when you feel it is right to be supportive, but if you are strongly opposed to something then you have to vote the way your conscience tells you. That is what I have always tried to do.”He believed that one of his strengths as a senator was that he was always thorough. His background in government and public service made him keenly aware of how important it was that legislation be accurate and precise. He tried to be balanced and impartial, but not a rubber stamper.“The number of times that an independent senator will actually vote against the government is very limited,” he said. “It did happened. You are not there to be a thorn in the side of the government. I voted against the taxi bill when it first came out in 2002. I voted against a couple of unemployment issues. I voted against the Hamilton legislation that stripped the Hamilton municipality of some of its powers in 2010. I voted against the Rosewood Tucker’s Point special development order earlier this year. That was probably my most contentious issues.“The taxi bill initially required taxis to have Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) devices. Of course, the senate can only delay things for a year. It doesn’t have the power to prevent something from eventually going through. In most cases you object sometimes to details. I’m sure the taxi bill could have been done differently. Eventually it was done, and is still contentious but wasn’t the end of the world when it finally passed.”Although he is now retired from the senate, he still has a great deal to keep him busy. He has been Vice President of Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences (BIOS) for many years. He is chairman of the business committee of the Bermuda Church Society which provides benefits for Anglican clergy. In 2012 he will be on the board of the Bermuda College.“I am an honorary fellow of the Bermuda College,” he said. “They have one position on the board and I will be that one person.”He has been awarded both Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) and Commander of the British Empire (CBE) by the Queen and continues to serve Bermuda as a justice of the peace.In his spare time he loves gardening. He doesn’t have a lot of space around his house for it, but he grows roses. He also loves brightening up the gardens of his four children and seven grandchildren.“My grandchildren call me the gardening grandpa,” he said.He and his wife Betsey have four children Winifred Blackmore, Ifor Hughes, Sian Harris and Mair Swift, and seven grandchildren.