Sean_C

Considering how hard women still struggle to get into the top positions in the workplace, is there any reason to think it wouldn't be even worse without affirmative action? The continued existence of hiring discrimination is indisputable. The current person being talked about for the job in many circles is Carolyn Bennett, who has a longtime association with aboriginal matters.

I think it may not be desirable from precisely that reason. An aboriginal serving in that job (which a lot of people would say inherently has colonialist overtones to it, and if you've read the Indian Act, it would be hard to argue otherwise) would be in a very awkward spot. And as far as language fluency goes, there are so many aboriginal languages that being fluent in even one or two wouldn't mean all that much to most of the population. Affirmative action has made an enormous impact on improving employment opportunity in the US, so that's by design.

In most cases there is no "best person for the job". There's a variety of qualified people (particularly in a system which tends to encourage assigning generalists, as the parliamentary system does, rather than hiring experts). And we've always assigned cabinet posts with things like geography as a factor; the notion that the cabinet should in some respect respect the Canadian population is not a radical one. As far as the size of the Cabinet, the core ministerial posts are: 1. Prime Minister 2. Minister of Finance 3. Minister of Justice and Attorney General 4. Minister of Foreign Affairs 5. Minister of National Defence 6. Minister of Industry 7. Minister of Transport 8. President of the Treasury Board 9. Minister of the Environment 10. Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness 11. Minister of International Trade 12. Minister of National Revenue 13. Minister of Veterans Affairs 14. Minister of Natural Resources 15. Minister of Health 16. Minister of Public Works and Government Services 17. Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs & President of the Privy Council 18. Minister for Aboriginal and Northern Affairs 19. Minister of Citizenship and Immigration 20. Minister of Agriculture 21. Minister of Labour 22. Minister of Fisheries and Oceans 23. Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development 24. Minister of Canadian Heritage 25. Minister of International Cooperation 26. Leader of the Government in the House of Commons 27. Chief Government Whip Sometimes the Chief Whip isn't a minister; you can also have a standalone Deputy PM, or give that on top of another ministerial job, or not use the title at all (Harper didn't; maybe the idea of there being a deputy prime minister offended his controlling tendencies). In the above list there's an odd number of posts, so he'd either have to cut it down by one or balance it out by one. So: Gentlemen 1. Justin Trudeau (QC) 2. Ralph Goodale (SK) 3. Dominic LeBlanc (NB) 4. Scott Brison (NS) 5. Sean Casey / Wayne Easter (PE) 6. Amarjeet Sohi / Randy Boissonnault (AB) 7. Kent Hehr / Darshan Kang (AB) 8. Marc Garneau (QC) 9. Stephane Dion (QC) 10. Bill Blair (ON) 12. John McCallum (ON) 13. Andrew Leslie (ON) 14. Harjit Sajjan (BC) Ladies 1. Chrystia Freeland (ON) 2. Judy Foote / Yvonne Jones (NL) 3. Joyce Murray (BC) 4. Jody Wilson-Raybould (BC) 5. Melanie Joly (QC) 6. Carolyn Bennett (ON) 7. Kirsty Duncan (ON) 8. MaryAnn Mihychuk (MB) 9. ? 10. ? 11. ? 12. ? 13. ? 14. ? The above list covers all the provinces that typically get a single minister. Of the bigger provinces: - Alberta has two and is probably maxed out, given the lack of female MPs. - British Columbia has three. It can probably expect at least four; Pamela Goldsmith-Jones and Carla Qualtrough probably being the most obvious choices. - Quebec has four, including Trudeau himself. A few more can be expected -- probably at least one from outside the city of Montreal. - Ontario has six, and can obviously expect more than that. Of the ones listed, five are from Toronto/the GTA, the only exception being Leslie, from Ottawa. Expect some to come from other parts of the province, which is likely a boon to people like Bardish Chagger (Waterloo), Maryam Monsef (Peterborough), and Patty Hadju (Thunder Bay). The above list also omits oft-talked-about individuals like Adam Vaughan, Jim Carr and Bill Morneau. Showing that this is going to require some pretty tough cutting in all circumstances. Or he'll have to create a few more minister of state-type jobs and raise the number above the minimum (which, he can do; the Tories had 40 people in cabinet, they can't criticize).