An Early New Years Present?
Rumour has it that Jim Prentice has lost his portfolio at Indian & Northern Affairs.
Rumour has it that Jim Prentice has lost his portfolio at Indian & Northern Affairs.
Designed by Gabfire slightly modified by stageleft
I’ve heard some rumours to that effect, but no confirmation yet. If true, it’s farewell to the biggest disappointment in Beloved Leader’s cabinet.
A lot of people, including me, were impressed with his appointment. Prentice had a pretty good reputation from his stint at the Claims Commission: smart, fair, excellent knowledge of land claims, good legal experience inf relocations, environmental issues, and negotiations.
But Prentice was a true Conservative, not one of the Calgary Cabal. He actually believed in honouring Canada legal and treaty negotiations, and that put him at odds with this government’s unstated but unmistakable policy of extinguishment and assimilation.
As Minister of Indian Affairs, in less than a year he’s squandered the considerable goodwill and credibility he built up over the years. He presided over the killing of the Kelowna Accord, the dismissal Tom Berger’s report on the Government’s failure to implement the Nunavut Claim, the stonewalling of several specific Claim negotiations: he has refused to meet with the national Aboriginal Land Claims Coalition; he ignored the crisis in Caledonia; and he has failed completely to articulate any kind of path forward for Canada and First Nations.
I’d like to believe he’s a decent guy saddled with Harper’s ideological yoke, but in the end it doesn’t matter: his biggest achievement as Minister of INAC has been to make his appalling Liberal predecessors actually look good.