Feminising the Canadian Cabinet
Trudeau to create parity, ready to name women to half
the posts:
by Lisa Kassenaar
Justin Trudeau promised in June that half his Cabinet would be female
if he was elected Canada’s Prime Minister. He has got the job, the women
– and the bruised egos of some experienced men who won’t make it to the
top tier of government.
Trudeau (43), intends appointing about 30 Cabinet portfolios from
finance to foreign affairs to fisheries. Among his ministers, normally
chosen from Members of Parliament, could be former journalist Chrystia
Freeland (47), co-chair of his Economic Council; Melanie Joly, (36), a
lawyer and former candidate for Mayor of Montreal and Jody Wilson-Raybould
(44), an aboriginal lawyer from British Columbia.
“It’s a message to Canadian women – young women in particular – that
this world is about you,” said Jean Charest, the former premier of
Quebec who put women in half his provincial ministries in 2007. “You
have to move beyond the old boy’s network.”
Moving beyond
Trudeau’s ‘parity cabinet’ is a first in a country where women
started voting in 1916, four years before similar rights in the US. It
ends a centuries-old habit by leaders of large English-speaking
countries, including the UK and US, to name men to a large majority of
government posts. France, Italy and the Nordic countries already have
had parity cabinets. Canada has been slower than others to elect women,
ranking No.50 last year in women’s government representation on the
International Parliamentary Union’s list of 190 countries, down from
17th in 1997.
For Trudeau, a self-declared feminist who won a majority government
last month in part by saying he’d bring new voices to Ottawa, selecting
a 50-50 cabinet isn’t so simple. First, he’s choosing from among 134 men
and 50 women Liberals MPs, so some long-standing male legislators will
be left out. Second, the new gender division comes on top of existing
cabinet-making criteria for regional, linguistic and ethnic
representation, including the practice of selecting at least one
minister from each of the country’s 10 provinces.
In some areas – Alberta, Saskatchewan, Prince Edward Island, the
North – the Liberals elected only men. In others, like Manitoba, just
one woman won a Liberal seat. Trudeau has also said he wants a smaller
cabinet than ousted Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who
finished nearly a decade in charge with 39 ministers, 12 of them women.
Trudeau is also expected to name a woman as his Chief of Staff.
“It’s a challenge, no doubt,” says Charest, a former national leader
of the Progressive Conservative party who took over the Quebec Liberals
in the late 1990s and led the province from 2003-2012. “There are lots
of people who legitimately feel they could sit around that table and
they won’t be there.”
Still, deliberate action to promote women in power is critical to
’’hurry history’’ and equalize female political participation, said
Laura Liswood, Co-founder, Council of Women World Leaders, a network of
female presidents and prime ministers.
Trudeau’s action sets a benchmark for his English-speaking Group of
Seven colleagues. US President Barack Obama’s 16-member cabinet is
currently 25 percent female; David Cameron’s UK cabinet is 33 percent
female.“We’ll see what happens,” Liswood said. “Number One that the sky
doesn’t fall.”
- bloomberg.com
|
