The army you have

Exciting new combinations of Liberals and syllables

Rechie Valdez teared up a bit taking her oath. It was nice.

I skipped almost the entire cabinet-shuffle business on Wednesday. I think I’ve mostly managed to avoid getting jaded in this job, but there are days, boy howdy. Welcome, Minister Blah Blah Blah to the crucial office of Provision, Preparedness, Children and Popular Song. Congratulations, hug your kids. Next.

Then here was Rechie Valdez’s voice catching as she took the oaths (one for entry into the Council of the Elders and the other to join the Resonant Circle of the One, or whatever) and for just a minute, boredom took a holiday. The people who do these jobs should be emotional about them. Optimism is a good thing. Small businesses are definitely on the list of things worth caring about. Go get ’em, minister.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of days like this. During the 2021 campaign, when things were going badly, the official line out of the Trudeau brain trust was that the prime minister “doesn’t do shakeups.” And yet here’s one now. What’s changed?

There are always two ready answers to such a question. For one, the world has changed, as it always does. Previous shuffles addressed the astonishing 2016 votes for Brexit and Trump, and the less epochal but still significant election of Doug Ford as Ontario premier in 2018. In late 2021, when Trudeau was randomly firing one of the most experienced ministers in his cabinet, it might still have been possible to believe the PM’s third term in office wouldn’t be dominated by Russia, China, and the knock-on effects from a sharp increase in immigration. The misplaced optimism of that bygone era 20 months ago can no longer be maintained.

Second, the electoral context has changed. “We have all the time in the world before the next election” has become “We sure don’t,” and the readers who get cross when I link to horse-race polls are going to hate clicking on this.

I guess this shuffle is designed to address the Poilievre threat? Kind of? Listlessly? A year ago Trudeau was already getting advice to make sharp, noticeable changes in his team, message and style. (Yes, I just linked to myself.) Today he put Sean Fraser in charge of Housing and Marc Miller in charge of Immigration. Those might be the two most encouraging moves among dozens, both for Liberals who hope “good communicators” won’t turn out to be a sad joke, and for citizens who hope strong administrators might, even if only occasionally, be put in charge of challenging files.

The rest of the day’s news is puzzling. Seamus O’Regan to Labour? [UPDATE: Seniors! He was already at Labour. Walked over my own punchline.] I thought the boss liked him. Pablo Rodriguez to Transport would seem to be yet another case of ministerial burnout on all those Web Giant-Killer bills that have become the torment of a succession of Heritage ministers. Pascale St.-Onge replaces him on the censorship ‘n’ subsidies beat, ringing a new variation on the eternal question: Why do they call it Canadian Heritage if only ministers from Quebec are allowed to do the job?

Gary Anandasangaree at Crown-Indigenous Relations and Arif Virani as Minister of Justice and Attorney-General are two cases of rookie ministers promoted to tough jobs. I’ve heard good things about both of them. Both have relevant committee and parliamentary-secretary experience. Virani was Jody Wilson-Raybould’s parliamentary secretary; she seems not to have kept many fond memories. (In her memoir she calls him one of the “talking heads” who were sent out “to make comments that evidence has now shown were not accurate or right.” In general, Trudeau, a non-lawyer mostly counselled by non-lawyers, seems to be chronically unsure why he should have a justice minister or what they are good for.)

Freeland, Guilbeault, Champagne and Joly remain in their previous jobs, evidence of their clout. On the other hand, I maintain that Rodriguez’s being shuffled was evidence of his clout. By now it’s clear that Freeland writes her own rules: she does the work she wants to do, to varying degrees of success, and nobody in this government can make her do anything else. Her fate is bound up with the prime minister’s. Probably neither of them expected it, but the stability of the tandem is now part of Trudeauworld’s game physics.

Cabinet shuffles defy confident prediction, or should. Will Jean-Yves Duclos make a difference as Public Services and Procurement Minister? He should. He’s a detail man in a detail job. But ministers are rarely better than they are permitted to be by circumstances and by the circle around the PM. Duclos will shine if this government wants to buy stuff, and not if it doesn’t.

That 2021 bit of campaign spin wasn’t entirely false. In some ways this prime minister really doesn’t do shakeups. He keeps his chief of staff, his indispensable deputy, his own way of thinking and talking about his government. Everything else swirls around. He came to office promising real change. Increasingly what’s real is what doesn’t change.