New Liberal Cabinet

Yasir Naqvi - young, energetic rising star who just won large re-election victory in Ottawa Centre.

Also a racial minority who brings diversity to the Liberal caucus.

I think McGuinty may want to elevate him.

The Liberals have a serious credibility issue on who they can pick for cabinet that relates to rural Ontario.  Where for instance do you get a Minister of Agriculture that even has a clue about the issues.  Jeff Leal from Peterborough is about the only choice and it is a pretty poor one given he really doesn't have the background.  This is going to mean a lock out for the Liberals in the next election and if the NDP is paying attention and opportunity for them to grow their base and start a march towards potential government.

Now this is a serious problem for the Liberals. McGuinty has up to seven vacancies to fill. In parts of the province they have no choice:

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/politics/provincialelection/article/1066347--leaner-cabinet-in-store-for-mcguinty-s-major-minority?

Sandals is overdue to be in cabinet. Leal, on the other hand, had not previously been considered a cabinet prospect, although he is Chief Government Whip.

The outgoing cabinet had 28 members, including McGuinty. Of these, 11 were from the GTA, 39%, about right. Three were from the Ottawa area, no problem. But four were from the Southwest's 11 ridings (London-Windsor), three from the North's 10 ridings, three from Central West's 9 ridings (Kitchener - Guelph - Perth- Huron-Bruce), two from Hamilton-Niagara's 10 ridings, and two from Central East (the seven ridings between the GTA and Ottawa). So is Dave Levac from Brantford (along with Liz Sandals) going to be in cabinet? Kim Craitor from Niagara Falls, along with Ted McMeekin from Hamilton? Jeff Leal along with John Gerretsen? Is Teresa Piruzza from Windsor in cabinet already? David Orazietti from the Sault or Bill Mauro from Thunder Bay?

In other words: is every single Liberal MPP outside the GTA, Ottawa region and the North going to be in cabinet?

An excellent reason why the Liberals should see that they need regional proportional representation as much as the NDP does.

Canadians are, sadly, used to seeing exaggerated regional differences in our federal elections. On May 2 this year, 256,167 Conservative voters in Saskatchewan elected 13 MPs while 627,962 Conservative voters in Quebec elected only five MPs. Similarly, 129,310 Liberal voters in Alberta elected no one while 130,577 Liberal voters in Nova Scotia elected four MPs. Now Ontario’s recent provincial election has joined this parade of stronghold politics. In two-thirds of Ontario’s electoral districts, Liberal strongholds -- the GTA, Ottawa, Hamilton-Niagara and the North -- it took only 26,000 Liberal voters to elect an MPP. Elsewhere it took 53,156 to do so. In the rest of Ontario, 36 of the 107 districts, Progressive Conservative strongholds, it took 25,667 PC voters to elect an MPP while elsewhere it took 73,858 to do so. In the Liberal stronghold regions it took 44,818 NDP voters to elect an MPP, while in the PC stronghold regions it took 153,966 NDP voters to elect an MPP. In Ontario’s outgoing cabinet of 28 members, nine were from those 36 districts. In last week’s election only nine Liberal MPPs were elected from those districts. Will all nine be in cabinet, including rookie Teresa Piruzza?

In the 23 ridings west of the GTA and Hamilton-Niagara, 388,961 PC voters elected 14 MPPs (27,782 votes per MPP), while 325,177 Liberal voters elected 7 MPPs (46,454 votes per MPP), and 215,730 NDP voters elected 2 MPPs (107,865 votes per MPP) In the 13 ridings outside the GTA from Barrie to Cornwall and Pembroke, 268,649 PC voters elected 11 MPPs (24,423 votes per MPP), 167,148 Liberal voters elected 2 MPPs (83,572 votes per MPP), and 102,616 NDP voters elected no one By contrast, in the 45 GTA ridings, 778,448 Liberal voters elected 31 MPPs (25,111 votes per MPP), 372,390 NDP voters elected six MPPs (62,065 votes per MPP), and 551,041 PC voters elected eight MPPs (68,880 votes per MPP). In the eight Ottawa-area ridings (note this includes Glengarry--Prescott—Russell which is 46% in the Ottawa metro area), 156,620 Liberal voters elected 6 MPPs (26,103 votes per MPP), 143,847 PC voters elected two MPPs (71,924 votes per MPP), and 60,092 NDP voters elected no one. In the ten ridings of Northern Ontario, 87,121 Liberal voters elected 4 MPPs (21,780 votes per MPP), 110,099 NDP voters elected 5 MPPs (22,020 votes per MPP), and 67,469 PC voters elected only one MPP. In the eight ridings of Hamilton-Niagara, 119,277 NDP voters elected four MPPs (29,819 votes per MPP), 107,912 Liberal voters elected three MPPs (35,971 votes per MPP), while 107,992 PC voters elected only one MPP. In summary: In the 36 ridings in southern Ontario outside the GTA, Ottawa, and Hamilton-Niagara, 641,669 PC voters elected 25 MPPs (25,667 votes per MPP), 478,407 Liberal voters elected 9 MPPs (53,156 votes per MPP), and 307,932 NDP voters elected 2 MPPs. (153,966 votes per MPP.) In the other 71 ridings, 1,144,019 Liberal voters elected 44 MPPs (26,000 votes per MPP), while 886,290 PC voters elected 12 MPPs (73,858 votes per MPP) and 672,272 NDP votes elected 15 MPPs (44,818 votes per MPP).

Sorry. I mis-typed. I meant 'votes' instead of 'majority'.

Farber is a possibility to replace Kwinter when he retires, but I haven't heard anything definite.

She might be right. The irony, of course, is that the way the NDP will succeed (and has improved up until now), is the extent to which it can mimic the Liberal party. i.e. be a centrist party making incremental policy change (without the arrogance). 

One of the many key differences between the NDP and the Liberals is that the NDP is all about populism while the Liberals always reek of arrogance and elitism and an attitude of entitlement.

I was expecting a spot at the table for Liz Sandals and a more senior level ministry for Glen Murray.

Aboriginal Affairs combined with Ministry of Housing and Municipalities?

Surprised not to see Mauro or Orazietti on the bench.

Also, Bartolucci at Northern Development and Mine scares me as he is more of a Sudbury man than a Northern man.  The Ring Of Fire Chromite processing should not be done in Sudbury as it is much further away than Thunder Bay or Timmins.  Hope this doesn't have any impact on that

The people of Guelph should take note. This is a put down.

Also, Yasir Naqvi...what a tool! He's what Ryan Cleary would call a "pancake politician."

Liz Sandals was a PC who jumped ship during the Harris years and ran against her former friend Brenda Elliott (Minister of Environment and Intergovernmental Affairs in Harris cabinets) as a Liberal. I think that her politics are still suspect in the minds of the people around the Premier. Donna Cansfield was another PC convert who also had a board of education background (former chair of Toronto District School Board). She made it into cabinet but was never granted any significant autonomy from the Premier`s office and Finance and was dumped when she started thinking out loud about some of the absurd stuff she was being forced to justify as Minister of Natural Resources. Sandals would be even less likely than Cansfield to shut up and do whatever Dwight Duncan (sorry, I mean Dalton McGuinty) tells her to do. Having said that, I agree that it seems unlikely that this is the last word on appointments.

I heard the same though other rumours are that Farber may get some sort of strategic appointment and Helen Burstyn would run in Kwinter's riding