Justin Trudeau is kicking off his third mandate with big moves, promoting environmental activist Steven Guilbeault to head up the Liberal government’s ambitious climate action plan, and moving Marc Garneau, the foreign affairs minister, and western representative Jim Carr out of cabinet, APA reports citing the Star.
The moves came in cabinet shuffle unveiled this morning that expanded cabinet to 38 ministers, kept gender parity and promoted several backbenchers and rookies as he shuffled some veterans to start the Liberals' third mandate focused on climate action, housing, and economic recovery.
Governor-General Mary May Simon oversaw her first swearing-in of the prime minister’s latest cabinet on a rainy Tuesday morning at Rideau Hall, more than a month after Canadians elected another minority Parliament.
To signal a fresh start, star performers like Oakville MP Anita Anand, who as a rookie procurement minister competed globally to secure vaccines for Canada, got big promotions.
Anand gets National Defence where she’ll be responsible for ensuring the military grapples with the crisis of sexual harassment in a more effective way than the outgoing Harjit Sajjan did.
The Conservatives had called on Trudeau to “fire” Sajjan, slamming his “track record of failure” in the six years since the Liberals came to power.
Sajjan, the former soldier and Vancouver police officer who is nonetheless seen by Trudeau and his inner circle as a political asset to the party, will remain in cabinet as minister for international development and responsible for the Pacific economic development agency.
Garneau is a former astronaut and a one-time Liberal leadership contender who challenged Trudeau to lead the party.
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