Redford constructing cabinet with largely recycled material
It's cabinet shuffle day at the Alberta legislature - which is another way of saying it's moving day at the Alberta legislature.
If previous shuffles are anything to go on, the legislature hallways will be clogged with the detritus of careers turned upside down: desks, chairs and glum-looking politicians who backed the wrong horse and suddenly find themselves ministers-turned-backbenchers with too much furniture for their new postage-stamp offices next door in the Annex building.
On Tuesday, though, the only thing clogging the legislature hallways was speculation as journalists, politicians and office staff made guesses, under the guise of educated predictions, about who'll be in cabinet heaven and who'll be in Annex hell.
Most Albertans don't care who's in cabinet - they just want competent government. That's what Premier Alison Redford is promising to deliver, starting with her cabinet.
She's not shuffling cabinet as much as rebuilding cabinet from the ground up. The problem for her is that because we have yet to go through a general election, she's building her cabinet with MLAs elected under Ed Stelmach in 2008. She's building cabinet using recycled wood, some of it dead.
If Redford was constructing a cabinet simply based on loyalty it would only have two members: herself and Art Johnston, the MLA for Calgary-Hays who was the single member of caucus to support her from Day 1 of the leadership campaign.
What do we know about cabinet? It will be smaller than the 23-member body that sat under Stelmach. Redford has indicated she will roll several ministries, including Children Services, Housing, Employment and Aboriginal Affairs, into one amalgamated Department of Human Services.
Obvious choices for cabinet include Doug Horner, who finished third in the leadership race and was named last week as deputy premier. Another is Dave Hancock, who was education minister in the old cabinet and was named government house leader last week. The appointment of Hancock, who supported runner-up Gary Mar in the leadership race, will help the process of healing rifts in the party.
Likely bets to be named to cabinet are leadership candidates Ted Morton and Doug Griffiths: Morton because he's a bridge to the rightwingers of the party who are flirting with the Wildrose; and Griffiths because he's a bridge to the party's members under 40.
Thorny choices include the sometimes prickly and always blunt Ron Liepert, who is a personal friend of Redford but who supported Mar for premier. Last week, Liepert said publicly he would not support Redford's campaign promise to call a public inquiry into allegations of intimidation against doctors in the health-care system. Liepert, himself a former health minister, said the inquiry isn't needed. Putting him in a Redford cabinet would be a signal to caucus that she is indeed a new kind of leader and open to criticism from her fellow MLAs.
It was understood among media and some senior officials in the premier's office that Liepert wouldn't be running again next election - but Liepert insists he hasn't made up his mind. "I have not made a decision whether I am running again, but am strongly leaning in that direction," he said in an email. "I have no idea whether I will be in cabinet or not, and regardless Alison and the party will have my full support."
And it would seem Redford and the PC party have the support of a large number of Albertans, according to a public-opinion poll by the Citizen Society Research Lab at Lethbridge College. According to a telephone poll conducted Oct. 1 and 2 (the weekend of the PC leadership vote), the party has the support of 48 per cent of decided voters (with a margin of error just under three percentage points). The Wildrose and NDP are virtually tied at 16 while the Liberals are at 13-per-cent support. The Alberta Party is at 3.1 per cent, which is pretty much the poll's margin of error.
Another poll conducted by Marc Henry of ThinkHQ Public Affairs from Sept. 19 to 24 (between the first and second votes in the PC leadership race) has the Tories at 40 per cent and the Wildrose at 24. Again, the NDP is doing better with 16-per-cent support than the Liberals at 14. And again, the Alberta Party is, statistically speaking, winking in and out of existence.
What these polls tell us is that the PCs are still the dominant force in Alberta politics and the Wildrose is still poised to overtake the Liberals as the official opposition.
Something else they tell us is that the Liberals don't seem to be getting any bump from choosing Raj Sherman as their new leader last month. Poll after poll has shown the Liberals in a virtual tie with the New Democrats.
Most of all, what these polls tell us is that Albertans seem to have infinite patience with the Conservatives - and it might not really matter who Redford appoints to her cabinet.
gthomson@edmontonjournal.com
