Update: After this story went to press Wednesday, it was announced that Ontario MP Andrew Leslie has been appointed parliamentary secretary to the minister of foreign affairs. It has yet to be announced where Goldsmith-Jones will end up.
When Prime Minister Justin Trudeau shuffled his cabinet last week, ousting long-time politician Stéphane Dion as foreign affairs minister, it also meant possible changes for Sea to Sky MP Pamela Goldsmith-Jones.
Goldsmith-Jones served as Parliamentary Secretary to Dion from December 2015 to last month.
She doesn’t yet know what will happen with her position.
“Now that the cabinet shuffle has happened the parliamentary secretaries are being interviewed and reviewed and will know between January 27 to 30,” Goldsmith-Jones told The Squamish Chief.
It is possible she could be reappointed as parliamentary secretary to the new minister of foreign affairs, Chrystia Freeland.
“It would be an honour to work with her,” Goldsmith-Jones said. “I think she is an outstanding choice.”
Freeland’s appointment reflects the importance to Trudeau’s government of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and its relationship to the U.S. in the wake of a Donald Trump election.
“He’s made some concerning comments about NAFTA… From our perspective all three countries have a longstanding relationship and our ties need to be very close,” she said.
Trump has said the trade and investment agreement between Canada, the United States and Mexico should be renegotiated.
Freeland retains the U.S.-Canada trade file, as well as taking on the role of Minister of Foreign Affairs. “Certainly, from a British Columbia perspective, negotiating the softwood lumber agreement is crucial,” Goldsmith-Jones said.
Goldsmith-Jones danced around questions of whether she was surprised to see Dion out of cabinet and seemingly out of political life after two decades in federal politics.
“I think what you see in the cabinet is a real team that is developing and is well integrated,” she answered.
Another change to cabinet was replacing former immigration minister John McCallum with MP Ahmed Hussen, who came to Canada as a Somalia refugee, taking over as minister of immigration, refugees and citizenship.
Goldsmith-Jones said the change won’t mean the current movement to amend the Citizenship Act started by Squamish’s Byrdie Funk, a “lost Canadian,” will be thwarted.
“The minister has changed, but the staff people have not,” Goldsmith-Jones said. “All the people that we have been working with don’t change at all.”
In December, Critic for Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Jenny Kwan flew Funk to Ottawa where the New Democrat member of Parliament tabled a private member’s bill in the House of Commons to amend the Citizenship Act. Should the federal government adopt the bill, it will cover those like Funk who came to Canada as babies and lost their citizenship due to an obscure rule that means they have to reapply for citizenship before turning 28 years old, as well as those who are second-generation Canadians born abroad and refugees who returned to their country of origin to visit and lost their citizenship.
Funk said it appears Hussen is a good fit for the minister’s role and hopes he “will support the momentum initiated by the Honourable John McCallum around lost Canadian issues. Forward movement in this area will impact many lives in a positive way,” she told The Chief.
