There's one main theme in Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills MLA Nathan Cooper's reaction to the provincial government's cabinet shuffle: the need for stability in various departments.
Cooper, the Wildrose Party house leader, says the government, elected just last May, has had too many cabinet shuffles. He says that has created confusion and uncertainty.
“Continually moving departments is not creating stable government and it's at a time like this when we are in the current economic state that we are, we need to have stable and predictable government,” Cooper told the Gazette.
“If we look at the department of Service Alberta, in this government's short tenure, Service Alberta has already had three ministers. It's my hope that this will be the last cabinet shuffle for quite some time because this government needs to focus on stabilizing the province, not continuing to create uncertainty.”
The government points out that five new ministers and one new associate minister have been named.
“This allows for a more evenly shared workload, with most ministers now responsible for a single portfolio,” a provincial news release says. “Alberta's cabinet is still smaller than any previous cabinet in the province over the past decade, and remains the smallest in Western Canada.”
Late last year, Agriculture and Forestry Minister O'Neill Carlier and Labour Minister Lori Sigurdson were right in the thick of a huge uproar over Bill 6, which sets rules -- including workers' compensation compliance -- for the farming sector.
Carlier retained his portfolios, but Sigurdson is now minister of seniors and housing. Christina Gray is the new labour minister.
“Certainly Bill 6 was not handled as well as it could be,” he said. “Now I'm certainly not in the business of defending the ag minister, but we did see (former labour minister) Lori Sigurdson who initially was taking the lead on that file receive a significant change in her portfolios.”
Cooper was asked if the shuffle of Sigurdson to a different portfolio was a result of that backlash.
“I think it's quite possible that it was reaction to the mishandling of the Bill 6 spectacle,” he said.
Cooper said the change in labour ministers is “a perfect example” of the danger of too many cabinet shuffles.
“We've seen incredible turnover in what used to be jobs, skills, training and labour,” he said.
“It is typically a very complicated and technical and nuanced department, and to continually be putting new ministers there certainly can create its own challenges.”
In addition to Carlier, several other ministers have stayed in their portfolios, including Joe Ceci as finance minister and Treasury Board president, Margaret Ellen McCuaig-Boyd as energy minister and David Eggen as education minister.
In regard to Ceci, Cooper said, “I think it would have been a real shock to see a change in finance minister right now. They're right in the middle of the 2016 budgeting process. They just finished the 2015 budgeting process.
“It would have been a significant disruption to the province to change the finance minister. So whether he's done a good job or not, I think that the risks of changing the finance minister would have outweighed any sort of benefit.”
When asked if Ceci has done a good job in his portfolio, Cooper said, “he certainly has done things differently than a Wildrose government would do them.
“There are lots of things the government has done that I don't think are good in terms of destabilizing the economy, killing many aspects of the Alberta advantage,” he said.
“He has delivered on the objectives that they set out to do and I fundamentally disagree with many of those objectives.”
The government was correct not to change energy ministers at this point, Cooper said.
“Certainly that portfolio is a critically important role and I'm not convinced that she has done the best job, but in the name of creating stability in the province it may have been a very good thing to keep the energy minister the same,” he said.
“The energy sector has been on such a roller coaster. When you look at the significant downturn in the price of oil, when you look at the fact that they've just come through a royalty review that was unwanted and unneeded and a sector that's bleeding jobs left, right and centre, it's critically important that the government does all that it can to support that sector, as it's so important to Alberta's economy.”
"It's my hope that this will be the last cabinet shuffle for quite some time because this government needs to focus on stabilizing the province, not continuing to create uncertainty."NATHAN COOPEROLDS-DIDSBURY-THREE HILLS MLA
