Kheiriddin: A Carney cabinet for the economy — but whose?
Prime Minister Mark Carney promised change, and Tuesday’s cabinet shuffle was his first test. But did he lose the “Just like Justin” tag once and for all? Not completely — and the west is unlikely to be happy about it.
Carney did return to the traditional Westminster model of a tiered cabinet, featuring a core of ministers and a phalanx of “junior ministers,” a.k.a. secretaries of state. The format allows ministers to focus on the big files while secretaries handle focused files, which are not necessarily connected to a department.
Trudeau had abandoned the model, in part due to his desire to have gender parity in cabinet — something that Carney achieves at the core level, with 14 men and 14 women, but does not at the secretary of state level, which features six men and four women.
What wasn’t in cabinet was anyone from the opposition parties. There was some speculation as to whether members of the NDP would be in cabinet, to get the government over the 172-member majority threshold. That didn’t happen — perhaps because of the........
© Montreal Gazette
