All through the historical past of the Canadian authorities, few jobs have been as little publicized because the clerk of the Privy Council, quickly to be stuffed by the lately appointed John Hannaford, a senior public servant and former diplomat. Whereas most Canadians could be onerous pressed to outline his new job, Mr. Hannaford is to not be underestimated.
“Except for the prime minister, the clerk of the Privy Council is essentially the most highly effective individual in Ottawa,” Donald J. Savoie, a professor at College of Moncton who research public administration, informed me. “So when a brand new clerk is appointed, it issues.”
When Mr. Hannaford formally takes over on June 24, he’ll change into, together with the deputy ministers beneath every cupboard minister, the gatekeeper accountable for turning the politicians’ coverage concepts into motion.
The clerk manages the deputy ministers and has three duties that generally overlap. He’s the top of the general public service, which is made up of nonpartisan bureaucrats who keep of their jobs as politicians and political events come and go.
The clerk can also be manages and coordinates the cupboard as its secretary, and maybe most essential of all, he’s the prime minister’s prime adviser.
Professor Savoie mentioned that the clerk and the prime minister meet a number of occasions every week and that every brings a separate agenda.
“A whole lot of key choices are made at these conferences,” he mentioned, including that these periods are sometimes extra essential than cupboard conferences. A cupboard minister, Professor Savoie mentioned, as soon as informed him that the cupboard had way back change into a “focus group for the prime minister.”
The development towards concentrating energy within the prime minister’s arms, and by extension the clerk’s, has been happening for many years beneath each Liberal and Conservative governments. And Professor Savoie mentioned that it’s not essentially an influence seize.
More and more, the federal authorities finds itself grappling with points, like local weather change, that contain a number of ministers, departments and businesses, and the function of the clerk is to coordinate that work.
A part of this association is that the clerk and the general public servants he instructions maintain out of public view. The federal government was unable to offer me with a high-resolution {photograph} of Mr. Hannaford, and the Privy Council Workplace mentioned that he was not accessible for an interview.
The considering behind that intentional obscurity is predicated on the concept the general public service is there to assist to the federal government of the day, no matter its political taste, and so it leaves politicians to be the federal government’s public face.
However a number of legal guidelines truly take away decision-making powers from cupboard ministers and place them with public servants. The consequence, Professor Savoie mentioned, is commonly conditions just like the latest backlogs in passport workplaces, as politicians needed to take the blame for choices by which they have been neither concerned nor even consulted.
Luc Juillet, a professor of public administration on the College of Ottawa, mentioned there was a bent amongst politicians to concentrate on new insurance policies and packages reasonably than the much less glamorous process of creating positive that the equipment of presidency runs easily.
“It’s not essentially the sort of factor that drives most politicians,” he mentioned.
Mr. Hannaford has a distinguished résumé as a coverage maker. A lawyer and diplomat who started his profession at what was then known as International Affairs, he has been an essential participant in commerce talks together with the latest renegotiation of NAFTA; has handled local weather points, most lately at Pure Sources Canada; and was as soon as a international and protection coverage adviser to Mr. Trudeau.
However absent from all that, Professor Juillet famous, is any intensive expertise in authorities operations.
To Professor Savoie, the appointment of somebody with Mr. Hannaford’s background in worldwide relations and protection is a sign from Mr. Trudeau of what he now views as the best challenges dealing with his authorities, that are largely worldwide. They embody allegations of Chinese language meddling in Canadian elections, commerce coverage in the US, international local weather change and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“The brand new worldwide order is filled with pitfalls, and the prime minister wants a serving to hand,” he mentioned.
-
Norimitsu Onishi went to Winnipeg to report on the Hudson’s Bay Firm’s donation of its former flagship retailer. Residents are debating whether or not it was an act of reconciliation with the Indigenous individuals who performed a vital function within the firm’s historical past or an empty present.
-
After I went to Alberta a number of weeks in the past to report on this week’s provincial election, I discovered various lifelong Conservative voters who have been delay by Premier Danielle Smith’s anti-vaccination stance and her libertarian agenda and generally inflammatory rhetoric. Ms. Smith’s United Conservative Social gathering authorities was returned to energy, however with considerably fewer seats within the legislature.
-
Wildfires proceed to burn after blanketing Halifax in smoke, consuming homes and forcing hundreds to evacuate throughout the metropolis’s metropolitan boundaries.
-
Within the persevering with evolution of Canadian antismoking warnings, particular person cigarettes will bear messages printed on their paper, together with “Poison in Each Puff.”
A local of Windsor, Ontario, Ian Austen was educated in Toronto, lives in Ottawa and has reported about Canada for The New York Occasions for the previous 16 years. Observe him on Twitter at @ianrausten.
How are we doing?
We’re desirous to have your ideas about this text and occasions in Canada typically. Please ship them to nytcanada@nytimes.com.
Like this electronic mail?
Ahead it to your pals, and allow them to know they’ll enroll right here.
