Thompson resigns from cabinet – let the speculation begin

The first big hint we had came in an interview Prime Minister Stephen Harper gave to Brian Lilley, the Ottawa bureau chief for Toronto radio station Newstalk 1010. Asked by Lilley if he'd shuffle his cabinet, he smiled and said "We'll be reviewing everything." The answer prime ministers normally give to such questions is simple, "no".

Some — and I was one — still had some doubts. After all, in an interview with Harper that I and my National Post colleague John Ivison had a couple of days earlier than Lilley's, Harper said he had given each of his ministers comprehensive new "mandate" letters — a cabinet minister's marching orders — that would reflect the new fiscal realities in Ottawa. It would seem unlikely that, after preparing and handing out mandate letters, Harper would let his cabinet waste a few weeks beginning to implement those new instructions only to re-assign each person and have each one start all over again.

Well, let any doubts be put aside for Veterans Affairs Minister Greg Thompson has announced that he is resigning from cabinet, effective immediately. That will almost certainly mean a trip to Rideau Hall and a swearing-in for at least one person next week.

Some other things we've learned from a variety of sources since that Lilley interview are:

1. Expect a relatively small shuffle. There are no changes to the big portfolios of Finance, Industry, Environment, Foreign Affairs and National Defence.
2. It will likely involve new assignments for Parliamentary Secretaries and Ministers of States.
3. It is unlikely that an MP who is not in cabinet will find themselves in cabinet. In other words; Harper is shuffling the cards, if you will, and will not reach into the deck for any new cards.

So let's start with Harper's first task: Find someone from New Brunswick to be that province's minister at the cabinet table. Thompson, whose time as an MP goes back to the days of Brian Mulroney, was cabinet's senior representative from New Brunswick. New Brunswick still has Keith Ashfield, the Frederiction MP and former New Brunswick cabinet minister, who is the minister responsible for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency. But Ashfield is a Minister of State and not a 'full' cabinet minister. Ministers of state attend cabinet committee meetings but do not attend or vote at full meetings of the cabinet. So, if you are inclined to believe #2 and #3 above, Keith Ashfield gets promoted to full minister. And someone else takes the ACOA wheel. Or, Ashfield takes Veteran Affairs and keeps ACOA. In an earlier cabinet, for example, Peter MacKay was both Foreign Affairs Minister and ACOA minister.

If you do not believe the truth of #3, then you can look to the other five Conservative MPs from New Brunswick. In terms of length of service as an MP, Rob Moore, from Fundy Royal, has the longest tenure next to Thompson's. He is currently the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice. I think it likely that he would have the inside track to move up to a minister's position. I also think MP Mike Allen will get some consideration and Harper may also look at Rodney Weston, who was once former New Brunswick premier Bernard Lord's chief aide.

Let's look at some other issues in this cabinet shuffle:

1. Maxime Bernier. Bernier, of course, resigned as foreign affairs minister after leaving top secret NATO documents at his girlfriend's house. In the subsequent election, his constituents forgave all rewarding him with a plurality of votes that was the best in his caucus — better than the MPs from True Blue Alberta! Some Conservatives want Bernier to go back in cabinet so he can get a minister's car and allowances and then proceed to use those resources to be on the road in Quebec as much as possible to beat up the Bloc Quebecois. My sources say Bernier doesn't need to be a cabinet minister to beat up the Bloc and that Harper is not a "second chance" kind of guy. Besides, I'm told, there are other MPs who deserve a chance to be a cabinet minister before Harper starts giving people second cracks. Bottom line: Bernier stays where he is as Chairman of the Commons committee on National Defence.

2. Quebec I had a rumour passed on to me that aides to Denis Lebel, the minister of state responsible for regional development in Quebec, were packing up boxes in his office last week. That Lebel was moving made sense given our earlier intelligence that this shuffle was going to involve ministers of state. It's my sense as well that Lebel has acquitted himself reasonably well in his job. Perhaps he moves to another minister of state assignment or jumps to full cabinet minister. Veterans Affairs might make sense for him, he comes from a riding — Roberval-Lac Saint-Jean — where there is a significant military presence in the form of CFB Bagotville, where our fighter jets are stationed. Of courrse, they could have just been putting in stuff in boxes while Lebel had his office painted over the break! My gut feeling: Lebel is moving.

3. Clement A Conservative political aide told me that Clement had been in to see Harper about his portfolio. Clement, I can assure you, is not moving from his job as Industry Minister but he does have two junior ministers with him: Secretary of State for Tourism and Small Business Diane Ablonczy and Secretary of State for Science and Technology Gary Goodyear. Was Harper talking to Clement about a move for Ablonczy or Goodyear? Ablonczy, you'll remember, was stripped of funding decisions after she gave Toronto's Pride Festival — the celebration of queer culture in that city — hundreds of thousands of dollars and that angered the far-right in the caucus like Saskatoon's Brad Trost. And Goodyear has come under for losing his temper and yelling and screaming at the academics and stakeholders he's supposed to work with. Goodyear, a chiropractor and evangelical Christian, has also taken jabs for his apparent lukewarm commitment to the science of evolution. My call: The move involves eitehr or both of Ablonczy and Goodyear.

4. Raitt There is some buzz on the Hill that Natural Resources Minister Lisa Raitt is going to be demoted, that she will be punished for the gaffe of aides who left tape recorders and documents lying around and other aides who apparently raised political campaign money for her using the resources of the federal Toronto Port Authority, where Raitt was once CEO. I  am discounting this rumours. Raitt is in the midst of a very big file right now: Getting the isotope production back on at the NRU and then selling off AECL. On her core mandate, she's moving those files forward and communicates on those files relatively well. That's more important to Harper than those other brushfires and, in any event, demoting her would signal to his political opponents that Raitt really had done something wrong. That, in turn, would allow Harper's political opponents to question his judgement in putting her in cabinet in the first place and, quite simply, Harper will not allow his opponents to have that opening. My call: Raitt stays put.

That's about all I've got right now but please chip in with your gossip and commentary below.

Tags: #JanCab, cabinet shuffle, Stephen Harper, Maxime Bernier, Lisa Raitt, Tony Clement, Denis Lebel, Gary Goodyear, Diane Ablonczy, Greg Thompson, Keith Ashfield