Carney Knows Two of His Ministers Are Floundering. He Just Won’t Do Anything About It.

Every prime minister ends up with a few ministers who aren’t up to the job. The test of leadership is what happens next. More than a year and a half into Mark Carney’s government, the answer appears to be: nothing.

In an October 9 column, The Globe and Mail’s Campbell Clark named Immigration Minister Lena Metlege Diab and Treasury Board President Shafqat Ali as “the two weakest links” in Carney’s cabinet. He added that it’s “not a secret,” and that “even some Liberals roll their eyes” at the Immigration Minister’s performance. Yet Carney still hasn’t shuffled either of them.

An Immigration Minister who didn’t recognize the case her file is built on

The 1985 Singh decision is the Supreme Court ruling that built Canada’s modern asylum system. It gave refugee claimants Charter rights and an oral hearing, and it led to the creation of the Immigration and Refugee Board. Any immigration minister should know it cold.

When a Radio-Canada podcast interviewer asked Metlege Diab about it in July, she didn’t seem to recognize it. “There are many Singhs and many decisions,” she said, according to the Globe. Her spokesperson blamed a language barrier and said the minister thought she was being asked about a specific case. But as Clark points out, the clip shows the minister repeating the 1985 date and the Supreme Court while the interviewer explained the ruling at length.

That would be a footnote if Singh weren’t so central to her job right now. The asylum changes the government passed this spring are facing extensive court challenges on grounds related to that very decision. The minister defending them in public apparently didn’t know the case.

“Something” happened

This isn’t the first time she has seemed lost. In June, her department suddenly emailed people who had received citizenship by descent under Bill C-3 and ordered them to surrender their citizenship certificates. Some were told their Canadian passports were no longer valid.

Asked what triggered the recalls, Metlege Diab said she ordered an investigation “the second I found out there was something, I wasn’t sure what it was,” CBC News reported. She was asked twice and still didn’t say what had gone wrong.

The department’s explanation came a full 17 days after the first emails went out, according to The Canadian Press via Global News. It said 100 people had been told to give back their certificates and blamed “unclear” department guidance. By then, 33 of them had already had their citizenship proof restored, and 67 cases were still under review. Ottawa immigration lawyer Cedric Marin said the approach was unfair because people were hit with the decision first and only asked for more documents afterward.

That’s what an immigration system run without a firm hand at the top looks like. As the Globe notes, Ottawa is also behind on its own targets to reduce temporary residents and “doesn’t have a clear immigration plan for the future.”

The Treasury Board’s “Invisible Man”

Shafqat Ali’s portfolio may be less flashy, but it matters. The Treasury Board is supposed to control spending, oversee regulations, and cut red tape. Those are all things Carney says are priorities.

Clark calls Ali “the cabinet’s Invisible Man.” His announcements usually come as written statements. At committee, he “tends to repeat rote talking points and refer substantive questions to his civil servants.”

When Ali did step up to a podium on October 7, it was to launch Bill S-7, the Cutting Red Tape for all Canadians Act. The bill amends 31 laws administered by 11 federal departments and agencies. But senior officials told reporters that only 11 of the roughly 500 red-tape measures departments identified are being handled in this bill, CBC News reported. The government’s own savings estimate is $264 million over 10 years for government and business combined.

For a country with an economy of Canada’s size, that is small change. According to the Globe, Ali couldn’t say how much the bill would boost the economy or explain why the savings were so modest, and he didn’t seem to know about the bill’s proposed changes to how statutory regulations are made.

When a reporter asked about the cost of bringing public servants back to the office, Ali answered with this: “I think, as we all know, that the time has changed and this is a time where the world is divided.” He went on to praise the Prime Minister’s economic vision. He never answered the question.

Comfortable in the polls, careless in government

Why hasn’t Carney acted? Clark’s answer is blunt: “The politics haven’t required it.” The Liberals are well ahead in the polls, and a shuffle would invite awkward questions and annoy backbenchers who get passed over.

That’s the problem. Carney sold himself as the serious manager who would run Ottawa like a professional. Serious managers don’t leave people in charge of immigration and federal spending when they can’t explain their own files, just because replacing them would be politically awkward.

Immigration is one of the most contentious issues in the country right now. Quebec’s new Parti Québécois government has put it at the top of its list of complaints. Four of the ten questions on Alberta’s October 19 referendum ballot were about immigration. And the Treasury Board is the office meant to rein in a government that keeps spending more.

These aren’t side files. Canadians are entitled to ministers who know what they’re doing, and a Prime Minister willing to replace the ones who don’t. On both counts, Carney is coming up short.

Sources: The Globe and Mail, Oct. 9, 2026; CBC News, June 23, 2026; Global News / The Canadian Press, June 30, 2026; CBC News, Oct. 7, 2026; Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat, Oct. 7, 2026.