'Who let her in??!' Minister's staff accidentally text deliberations about 15 per cent spending cut to reporter

OTTAWA — With ministers due to present their proposals for a 15 per cent spending review, deciding where to cut carries inescapable “political consequences,” according to the staff of Environment Minister Julie Dabrusin.

A rare glimpse into the internal deliberations was offered to National Post — when one of her staff accidentally added a reporter to a group chat.

“Who let her in??!” one of the staffers wrote, to which another reacted with “ha ha.”

The conversation took place last Thursday, exactly one week before the Aug. 28 deadline, when ministers were due to present their plans for achieving a 15 per cent spending reduction, starting with a 7.5 per cent cut next fiscal year. An additional 2.5 per cent reduction has been set for the following year, with an additional five per cent cut in 2028-29.

During the April federal election campaign, Prime Minister Mark Carney promised to launch a “comprehensive review” of government spending, promising he would lead a more fiscally-disciplined government.

The reductions have been earmarked to help fund commitments Carney has made to boost defence spending to the tune of around $9 billion for Canada to meet its NATO defence spending target of 2 per cent of GDP, as well as finance other tax cuts.

Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne is set to table the Carney government’s first budget in October.

As he and Carney prepare to receive proposals for spending cuts, political staff, as well as those across departments and agencies, have been weighing where the cuts could come from and what impacts such decisions would have on operations.

Such was the case last Thursday, when staff in Dabrusin’s office deliberated on options, including what to do regarding the Canada Water Agency, which has the mandate to help manage the protection of Canada’s freshwater lakes and river systems.

The agency itself is headquartered in Winnipeg and has its own president, Mark Fisher, but falls under the responsibility of the federal environment minister.

In the group text, part of which the reporter was added to before being removed, Dabrusin’s senior policy advisor wrote to three others, including the minister’s chief of staff, relaying information from a conversation she had with a “Mark” that, “Yes, this cut could lead to less algal bloom restoration work across the country (notably not the Great Lakes — that will be retained)”

The staffer added that no other departments do that kind of work. “Others only do science and monitoring.”

Dabrusin’s chief of staff then directs the staffer to update Dabrusin via text.

“Eek I don’t know how to help the (minister)” the senior policy advisor wrote back.

“There is nowhere else to cut … she could ask for steeper cuts in (Environment and Climate Change Canada) or accept these (Canada Water Agency) cuts and commit to raising her concerns at (Treasury Board)? Their annual budget is so small you can’t escape political consequences with a 15 per cent cut.”

Reached for comment, a spokeswoman for Dabrusin did not explain how a reporter, who discovered the text conversation upon returning from vacation on Monday, ended up added to the group chat, nor confirm specifics around the internal conversation.

Instead, Jenna Ghassabeh pointed to Carney’s promised spending review.

“As part of that mandate, we are comprehensively reviewing government spending to ensure programming is being delivered efficiently and effectively,” Ghassabeh said.

“While this process requires candid discussions on various options, no final funding decisions have been taken at this time.”

Earlier this year, the White House dealt with the fallout from a much higher-stakes leak after The Atlantic magazine’s editor-in-chief was added to a Signal group text by U.S. President Donald Trump’s national security advisor, where he and other top administration officials discussed a strike against the Houthis in Yemen.

In Canada, Mohammad Kamal, a spokesman for the Treasury Board President Shafqat Ali, said that departments and agencies were still working on their savings plans, details of which he said would be kept secret, save for Carney’s cabinet, until decisions were finalized.

A spokesman for the Canada Water Agency did not answer direct questions about conversations between the agency’s president and Dabrusin’s office about proposed cuts.

“Organizations are being asked to bring forward ambitious savings proposals to spend less on the day-to-day running of government by targeting programs and activities that are underperforming, not core to the federal mandate, duplicative, or misaligned with government priorities,” wrote spokesman Joseph Peloquin-Hopfner.

Andrew Van Iterson, a spokesman for the Green Budget Coalition, which represents upwards of 20 different environmental and conservation organizations, said that broadly speaking, he sees value in the government undertaking a spending review.

“At the same time,” he said in an interview, “Environment Canada is one of the smallest, least funded departments.”

He said that comes as Canada and the rest of the world are trying to address climate and biodiversity issues.

“So broadly, we understand the drive to review … spending. But we’re also really nervous about what that could mean, because in the broader government budget, environmental spending is relatively small, and there’s a lot of really critical pieces there.”

National Post

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