EXCEPTIONAL CHALLENGES

Horgan's new cabinet immediately faces menacing pandemic, threats to economy

Premier John Horgan handed out some tough assignments Thursday in appointing the cabinet for a government beset by twin challenges of pandemic and economic recovery.

New Finance Minister Selina Robinson inherits the biggest deficit by far in B.C. history — $13 billion and counting — and enough fiscal hurdles that there's already talk of delaying release of the next budget beyond the usual date in February.

She takes over from retiring Carole James, the gold standard for ministers in the first term of the Horgan government and one of the most widely admired B.C. politicians in modern times.

A sigh of relief might have gone through the whole province when Horgan disclosed that he'd persuaded James to stay on “as special adviser to me” for the princely sum of $1 a year. He joked that he'd offered her $5 for a five-year contract, but James insisted on taking it one year at a time.

The second-biggest assignment went to a newcomer to the cabinet table, second-term NDP MLA Ravi Kahlon. He's the new jobs minister, taking over from Michelle Mungall, who also retired.

But Horgan disclosed that the ministry has been beefed up with all of the COVID-19 economic recovery programs announced before and promised during the election.

With Adrian Dix staying on in health — who else could it have been? — he and Kahlon will be the lead ministers as the government struggles to shake off the health and economic fallout from the pandemic.

Another major challenge went to Murray Rankin, the former NDP federal MP, appointed minister of Indigenous relations and reconciliation.

Thursday was also the first anniversary of B.C.'s endorsement by legislation of the UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. But the province hasn't made much progress since then in translating the UN principles into provincial law and public policy.

The pandemic is one reason. The summer-to-fall buildup to the election is another.

Rankin is familiar with a third holdup: he's been on retainer to the province (paid almost $150,000 in fees and expenses) to try to sort out the seemingly intractable standoff with the hereditary chiefs of the Wet'suwet'en people.

“Murray knows the law better than anyone in the legislature,” said Horgan, citing Rankin's experience as a legal and constitutional expert.

But the premier also acknowledged that the new minister lags behind Scott Fraser, his retired non-lawyer predecessor, in developing relationships with B.C.'s more than 200 recognized First Nations.

Expectations are high about what can be accomplished in the year ahead. Horgan has already taken some heat for short-shrifting the UNDRIP principles in some of the legislation he tabled last summer.

Rankin was one of four newly elected NDP MLAs to be elevated straight to the cabinet table without having to do a turn in the backbench.

Another was Rankin's former colleague in the federal parliament, Nathan Cullen, the new minister of state for lands and natural resource operations.

Ministers of state do not have the same complement of staff, budgets and resources as a fullblown minister.

But lest the Cullen appointment be taken as a consolation prize, Horgan said his assignment is to carve out a new ministry of lands and resources from the existing Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development — an unwieldy behemoth created in the dying days of Premier Gordon Campbell's term of office.

Presuming the newbie Cullen can navigate through the shoals and reefs of the B.C. bureaucracy, there will eventually be two ministries where only one stood before.

Appointed minister of forests, etc., for now is Katrine Conroy, 15-year veteran MLA from Kootenay East. Horgan noted she is the first woman to serve as minister of forests. Reporters noted that she and Cullen are the only members of the NDP cabinet representing the North and Interior.

The other two rookie MLAs to be granted a spot at the cabinet table were Josie Osborne and Jennifer Whiteside. Osborne, who stepped down as mayor of Tofino on being elected MLA for Mid Island-Pacific Rim, is the new minister of municipal affairs.

She inherits a more manageable portfolio. Horgan shifted all of the NDP's critically important housing programs to the bailiwick of the inexhaustible Attorney General David Eby.

Whiteside, the secretary business manager for the Hospital Employees' Union, is the new minister of education, inheriting the job of maintaining the NDP relationship with the B.C. Teachers' Federation.

Shed not a tear for former education minister Rob Fleming. He inherits the ministry of transportation and infrastructure, along with a $900-million operating budget and a $7-billion, threeyear capital plan.

Transportation has its challenges as well, especially for a Victoria-based minister responsible for B.C. Ferries. But compared to this year's wrenching discussions with teachers, trustees and students, Fleming should find it a relief to put on the ministerial hard hat (and mask, of course) and visit some work sites.

His biggest challenge may be keeping an eye on the new minister of state for infrastructure, Bowinn Ma.

The able and ambitious Ma was on many a short list in speculation about who might make it to the cabinet table. The junior status may not sit well with her or her admirers.