COOK ON CARLAW: Shuffling a cabinet has drawbacks

BOB COOK

January 29, 2010

Prime Minister Stephen Harper shuffled his cabinet recently and for the people involved, the learning curve is pretty scary.

Here's why.

Let's say, a year ago someone became the minister of labour. The job requires them to learn what jobs people have or don't have. Then they have to learn how to create jobs so that people can labour at them. They will then meet people who hire people so they can say that labour was found for the public to work at. Then there are the labour issues like safety, equal pay and working in the dark.

Let's be real, it can take years for a minister of labour to learn all this stuff.

But just when you think you're getting a handle on it, your boss tells you he's moving you to public works, which means all that labour stuff you were learning can now be forgotten.

You now have to learn how "public" works affects the population of Stayner, Sherbrooke and Moosonee.

How about the guy who was the minister of national revenue Wednesday and woke up Thursday to find out he's now minister of veteran affairs. You go from learning how to make a small amount of revenue look like a lot to learning why false teeth aren't in the budget for someone who sang the songs of Vera Lynn.

How about the minister of public safety being moved to international trade? One minute you're learning the dangers the public feels when they can't get tickets to Anne of Green Gables to discussing Chilean grape prices with people you can't comprehend. You also have to learn in quick order the rain that fell in Barcelona affects the price of beef in Argentina. I mean who knew?

But that's nothing compared to the minister of trade being moved to the treasury board. I mean one minute you're learning how to trade hockey cards and gold bullion to now having to learn the treasury board is all about stopping people from spending money, which in government is like asking people with poison ivy not to scratch.

Let's not even think about the guy who had to remember all that stuff about nuclear energy and then was told he was now minister of fisheries.

Or the minister of transportation who finally memorized all the highway numbers in Canada only to be told he was now minister of the Atlantic Gateway, a position he didn't know existed 12 hours before.

And that brings me to the predicament my friend experienced a couple of days ago. She phoned the ministry of finance asking about her taxes and instead got a detailed account on the spawning habits of trout. At least now she knows that her taxes are not based on what trout do in the off-season.