Liberals face test picking new minister to engage with oilpatch

CALGARY The Liberals’ electoral shutout in Alberta and Saskatchewan and the unceremonious unseating of Natural Resources Minister Amarjeet Sohi has posed a major headache for the re-elected governing party: finding a minister who can engage with the oilpatch.

The Liberals lost their seats in Regina, Calgary and Edmonton, where Sohi lost to Conservative Tim Uppal, in Monday’s federal election, resulting in a Liberal minority government without representation in the country’s biggest oil- and gas-producing provinces.

A minority government, potentially aided by parties hostile to the oilpatch, has already cast a gloom over downtown Calgary.

The mood was further darkened after Husky Energy Inc. said Tuesday it was laying off an undisclosed number of staff, adding to Alberta’s high unemployment rate, which stands at 6.6 per cent — a full point above the national average.

Without a voice from Alberta and Saskatchewan among its ranks, the Liberals are ill-prepared to deal with the challenges facing the oil and gas sector, which produces Canada’s largest export product, analysts say.

Both Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Bill Morneau, who has been finance minister, had said the government would reach out to the two provinces but analysts say that effort will be fraught with challenges, including picking a natural resources

There’s clearly a problem. I don’t think there’s an easy solution.

minister who can navigate the minefield that’s the oil and gas sector in a country that handed 70 per cent of the seats to parties supportive of tackling climate change.

In years past, former prime minister Stephen Harper would use senators as ministers from regions where he lacked elected representatives. But Trudeau’s decision to turn Liberal senators into an independent block leaves him without that option.

“There’s clearly a problem. I don’t think there’s an easy solution,” said Ted Morton, an executive fellow at the University of Calgary and formerly a long-time cabinet minister in Alberta provincial politics. “If they can find a minister who is connected to Bay Street, to federal finance and can articulate the importance of the energy sector to the economy and Trudeau’s commitment to following through on Trans Mountain, then that’s the best they can do,” Morton said.

Even if Trudeau finds such a minister, the government still faces a challenge in relating to the struggles of working people in the province, Morton said.