OTTAWA, May 27 (Reuters) – Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney thanked his former cabinet minister Steven Guilbeault on Wednesday ahead of his expected resignation from the \u200cLiberal party’s caucus later in the day over dissatisfaction with government climate policies.<\/p>\n
Guilbeault’s \u200cplanned resignation, first reported by the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star, will reduce the already slim \u200bmajority of Carney’s Liberals in Parliament to one seat.<\/p>\n
Carney thanked Guilbeault for his many contributions to the people of Canada, saying they worked together when the prime minister was a United Nations special representative for climate.<\/p>\n
“It’s for him to make decisions about his career,” Carney said. “I \u200cwish him all the best \u2060and I’m sure in some way, shape or form, we’ll have an opportunity to continue to work together on issues of interest.”<\/p>\n
In November, \u2060Guilbeault, then identity and culture minister, quit Carney\u2019s cabinet over his opposition to a deal Ottawa made with the oil-producing province of Alberta to roll back certain climate rules to spur investment \u200bin \u200benergy production.<\/p>\n
Guilbeault previously served as environment minister under \u200bformer Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.<\/p>\n
Carney’s government \u200csecured a majority in April, after three special elections in Ontario and Quebec gave his Liberal party 174 seats in the 343-seat House of Commons.<\/p>\n
Carney had said a majority would help him deal more effectively with the trade war started by U.S. President Donald Trump, in addition to likely sparing him another election for years and making it easier \u200cto pass legislation. The Liberals need 172 seats for \u200ba bare majority.<\/p>\n
Laura Stephenson, a professor of political \u200bscience at the University of Western Ontario, \u200bsaid Guilbeault’s resignation showed parts of the Liberal party might not \u200cbe on board with Carney’s policies prioritizing \u200bthe economy.<\/p>\n
She said several \u200bother Liberal lawmakers have suggested they might also quit, possibly leaving Carney with another minority government.<\/p>\n
“It’s tricky to balance concerns from the West that deal with energy \u200bwhile also supporting those \u200cwho like the party’s more leftist-environmental bent,” she said. “Carney’s got a clear vision, \u200bbut whether his party will unite behind him at all times is not \u200bclear.”<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Maria ChengEditing by Tomasz Janowski)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"OTTAWA, May 27 (Reuters) – Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney thanked his former cabinet minister Steven Guilbeault on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":63299,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[7442,19390,1753,111,2877,27171,13894],"class_list":["post-63298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mark-carney","tag-cabinet-minister","tag-guilbeault","tag-liberal-party","tag-mark-carney","tag-prime-minister-justin-trudeau","tag-resignation","tag-steven-guilbeault"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63298"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63298\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63299"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}