Canadian PM names Murray as new minister

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Monday reached deep into his caucus to replace a Cabinet minister who resigned over the handling of a corporate corruption case that has damaged the ruling Liberals’ hopes of re-election in October.

Trudeau has been on the defensive since Feb 7 over allegations that top officials leaned on former Justice Minister Jody Wilson-raybould to ensure engineering and construction firm Snc-lavalin Group Inc avoided a corruption trial.

The scandal, which has led to the resignations of two ministers and Trudeau’s closest adviser, is the most serious faced by the 47-year-old leader since he led the Liberals out of the political wilderness and into power in 2015.

In a surprise move on Monday, Trudeau named Joyce Murray, a 64-year-old Liberal backbencher, as president of the Treasury Board, where she will be in overall charge of government spending.

Murray replaces Jane Philpot, who quit on March 4 in protest over how the government was handling the Snc-lavalin case. Wilson-raybould, who was demoted in January, resigned from Trudeau’s Cabinet the next month. It is the first federal Cabinet post for Murray, who had previously been a provincial government minister in British Columbia. The move also was the third shuffle of Trudeau’s Cabinet in the past three months.

Recent opinion polls show the Liberals could be ousted by the resurgent Conservatives in October. The Conservatives, the largest opposition party in parliament, accuse Trudeau of a cover-up of the Snc-lavalin scandal.

Earlier this month, Trudeau denied he or his officials had interfered in Canada’s judicial system, and he offered no apology. He admited lessons could be learned and blamed himself for not having realized Wilson-raybould was unhappy.

“It has been a challenging few weeks and the prime minister has acknowledged that he could do beter,” Murray told reporters ater being sworn into her new position.

“There was a communications breakdown... and we all have made a commitment to be aware of that and seek ways to improve communications,” she continued.