The Twenty-Eighth Canadian Ministry was the

Cabinet Cabinet or The Cabinet may refer to: Furniture * Cabinetry, a box-shaped piece of furniture with doors and/or drawers * Display cabinet, a piece of furniture with one or more transparent glass sheets or transparent polycarbonate sheets * Filing ...

, chaired by

Prime Minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is not ...

Stephen Harper Stephen Joseph Harper (born April 30, 1959) is a Canadian politician who served as the 22nd prime minister of Canada from 2006 to 2015. Harper is the first and only prime minister to come from the modern-day Conservative Party of Canada, ...

, that governed

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

from the beginning of the 39th Parliament to the end of the 41st Parliament. Its original members were sworn into the

Queen's Privy Council for Canada The 's Privy Council for Canada (french: Conseil privé du Roi pour le Canada),) during the reign of a queen. sometimes called Majesty's Privy Council for Canada or simply the Privy Council (PC), is the full group of personal consultants to the ...

on February 6, 2006, exactly two weeks after the 2006 federal election and nine weeks and six days after the end of the 38th Canadian Parliament. Smaller than its recent predecessors, the

Conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...

Cabinet originally consisted of 27 members, including the Prime Minister. On January 4, 2007, five Secretaries of State were added to the ministry who are not members of the Cabinet itself. The cabinet resigned on the morning of November 4, 2015. Only 24 of the original members were elected to serve as

Members of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members of ...

(MP) in 2006; Senator

Marjory LeBreton Marjory LeBreton (born July 4, 1940) is a Canadian former leader of the Government in the Senate of Canada, a cabinet-rank position; and past national chair of Mothers Against Drunk Driving in Canada. She worked with four leaders of the Progres ...

is the Leader of the Government in the Senate. The other two choices that raised some controversy were

David Emerson David Lee Emerson, (born September 17, 1945) is a Canadian politician, financial executive, and economist. He was formerly the Member of Parliament for the riding of Vancouver Kingsway. He was first elected as a Liberal and served as Minist ...

, who was elected as a Liberal, but crossed the floor between the election and the swearing-in of the Cabinet to serve as Minister of International Trade, of the Pacific Gateway, and of the Vancouver-Whistler Olympics, and

Michael Fortier Michael M. Fortier, (born January 10, 1962) is a Canadian financier, lawyer and former politician. A member of the Conservative Party, he served as Minister of Public Works and Government Services from 2006 to 2008, and Minister of Internati ...

, a Montreal-area member of the former Progressive Conservatives and co-chair of the Conservatives' 2006 federal campaign, who was not elected as an MP but was named a Senator on February 27, 2006, and subsequently served as Minister of Public Works and Government Services. The reason given for the appointments of Emerson and Fortier was that the Conservatives were completely shut out of the three most populous cities in Canada –

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

, and

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

. The Liberals were the only party to win seats in all three, with the Bloc represented in Montreal and the NDP in Toronto and Vancouver. Emerson's riding is

Vancouver Kingsway Vancouver Kingsway is a federal electoral district in British Columbia, Canada, that has been represented in the House of Commons of Canada from 1953 to 1988 and since 1997. It is located in Vancouver. Demographics This riding's population is ...

, and Fortier lives and works in the Montreal-Laval area, and ran for the riding of Laval West for the Tories in 2000. The only major city this left out was Toronto, although the Conservatives have indicated that they consider that enough Cabinet Ministers are from the

Greater Toronto Area The Greater Toronto Area, commonly referred to as the GTA, includes the City of Toronto and the regional municipalities of Durham, Halton, Peel, and York. In total, the region contains 25 urban, suburban, and rural municipalities. The Greater T ...

, including

Jim Flaherty James Michael Flaherty (December 30, 1949 – April 10, 2014) was a Canadian politician who served as the federal minister of finance from 2006 to 2014 under Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper. First elected to the Legislative Assembly ...

and

Bev Oda Beverley Joan "Bev" Oda (born July 27, 1944) is a retired Canadian politician. She was a member of the House of Commons of Canada, as well as the first Japanese-Canadian MP and List of Visible Minority Canadian Cabinet Ministers, cabinet minist ...

, to adequately represent the city in Cabinet. Contrary to precedent, Harper did not name a

Deputy Prime Minister A deputy prime minister or vice prime minister is, in some countries, a government minister who can take the position of acting prime minister when the prime minister is temporarily absent. The position is often likened to that of a vice president, ...

, confounding rumours that Quebec lieutenant

Lawrence Cannon Lawrence Cannon, (born December 6, 1947) is a Canadian politician from Quebec and Prime Minister Stephen Harper's former Quebec lieutenant. In early 2006, he was made the Minister of Transport. On October 30, 2008, he relinquished oversight of T ...

or Conservative deputy leader

Peter MacKay Peter Gordon MacKay (born September 27, 1965) is a Canadian lawyer and politician. He was a Member of Parliament from 1997 to 2015 and has served as Minister of Justice and Attorney General (2013–2015), Minister of National Defence (2007� ...

might be awarded the honorary post. Harper's explanation was that, instead, any replacement Prime Minister would be named as required and this assignment could be conferred upon different ministers.

List of ministers

By minister

Note: This is in

Order of Precedence An order of precedence is a sequential hierarchy of nominal importance and can be applied to individuals, groups, or organizations. Most often it is used in the context of people by many organizations and governments, for very formal and state o ...

, which is established by the chronological order of appointment to the

, then in order of election or appointment to parliament for ministers who joined the Privy Council on the same day. ¹ Styled as Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development until May 18, 2011

By portfolio

Earlier ministers

References

Succession