MORGAN: Mark Holland is an activist first, Health Minister second

As Prime Minister Trudeau grinds his way through the Liberal caucus for cabinet members, the quality of the people he appoints becomes increasingly questionable. The Trudeau government has been in power for nearly a decade with many MPs having come and gone from cabinet positions. Recycling past cabinet ministers tends to be frowned upon and with a 38 cabinet positions to fill and a tiring minority government caucus to draw from, suffice it to say Canadians aren’t being served by a top tier team of ministers right now.

Dwindling popularity and increasing electoral anxiety of the Trudeau Liberals is impacting the selection of cabinet members. Ministers are being selected for their ability to garner the public spotlight and fight in the political battlefield rather than for skills they may apply to the ministry itself. Trudeau wants campaigners in cabinet rather than administrators and it shows in the tone of the House of Commons and the actions of the ministers.

Activists rather than experts are heading important ministries and it’s leading to bad policies. Environment Minister Steven Guilbuealt is the first minister who comes to mind when one thinks of activists in senior cabinet roles. Guilbeault’s history of extreme environmental activism is well documented and as Canada’s Environment Minister, he has chilled energy investment with his obsessive, anti-fossil fuel stances. Canada’s health ministry is being headed by an activist who is no less ideological than Guilbeault though his history of activism is more subtle. Health Minister Mark Holland’s stances on policy reflect an activist dedicated to serving his past employers more than a man committed to bringing in effective health care policies for Canadians.

Minister Holland sounded outright unhinged when he responded to a benign question regarding a tax increase with a rant about how family road trips are going to “let the planet burn.”

“Mr. Speaker, there is good news for kids,” Holland said. “They can take a summer fun-time vacation where they are locked in a car for 10 consecutive days non-stop, with no bathroom breaks, and the Conservatives have a plan for them to have that summertime fun.”

The outburst was bizarre and unbecoming from somebody ostensibly tasked with crafting Canadian health care policies. Holland was doubtless instructed to take shots at the Conservatives however possible and felt a tirade on family road trips was the way to get there. It probably didn’t inspire any families to forgo road trips nor did it score points against Poilievre’s party. It did expose a minister more focused on political brinkmanship than on his ministry and with a ministry as important as health, this is concerning.

On top of his partisan distractions, Holland’s activism is overriding his commitment to the health of Canadians. While harm mitigation for addictions is a popular policy among progressives, it apparently only applies to substances such as fentanyl and heroin. When it comes to nicotine replacement products for smokers, Holland is inexplicably opposed to them.

Nicotine pouches are a smoking cessation product approved for sale in Canada but are under attack from Holland. The pouches are not marketed toward minors nor are they legally available to them. There is no evidence that people are becoming addicted to nicotine through pouches but there is evidence that many people have switched from smoking to using pouches which are much less harmful.

So why is Holland opposed to a product that protects Canadians from harm?

It comes down to his activist history.

Holland is a career politico. His education is in political science, he began his career working for a Liberal MP, he entered electoral politics as a city councillor and finally won a federal seat as a Liberal MP in 2004. Voters fired Holland in the 2011 general election and he couldn’t get back into parliament until 2015. During his four years in electoral exile, he took on a job with the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada where he got to taste life as a paid activist.

While the Heart and Stroke Foundation promotes good health, it’s technically a lobbyist group and is registered in Canada as one. Despite being a lobbyist, the group is funded largely by grants from the federal government. In other words, the federal government is spending money to lobby itself. That makes for something of a conflict of interest for the current health minister even if it’s legal.

Further, one of the largest donors to the Heart and Stroke Foundation is Novartis. Novartis is the pharmaceutical company behind Habitrol nicotine patches and owns 36.5% of the business. Novartis certainly doesn’t want to see competitors entering the scene with nicotine pouches, the Heart and Stroke Foundation certainly doesn’t want to make Novartis unhappy, and Mark Holland certainly doesn’t want to make the Heart and Stroke Foundation unhappy. Things are looking bleak for the federal Liberals right now and Minister Holland may want to go back to work as an activist after the next election.

It’s all part of an inbred system of backscratching, funding transfers and lobbying. That’s just the nature of politics.

When lobbyists and activists get into positions as cabinet ministers, Canadians suffer as policies become based on ideologies or political favours. Until a fresh new crop of ministers is appointed in Canada’s federal cabinet, we can unfortunately look forward to more unreasonable stances against Canadian energy production from Steven Guilbeault and more bizarre stances against harm mitigation products from Mark Holland. Not to mention demonization of family road trips.