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Second, the call for “expertise” and “experience” clearly misunderstands (or misrepresents) the role of the government caucus and the cabinet. Ministers shouldn’t be running departments; a professional and non-partisan public service should be doing that. The politician’s role, sitting alone in the minister’s office, or sitting around the cabinet or caucus table, is to build and manage relationships, see possibilities and recognize dead ends, establish public policy priorities, play a role in allocating resources, always with a view to doing well for all the people of the province. The capacity to contribute to this, effectively, is generally not revealed in the text of three-to-five paragraph biographies.

Third, in turbulent and uncertain times, it is impossible to know what expertise and capability will serve Alberta well for the next four years. The people who are putting a premium on “expertise” are the people who believe that the future is going to be more of the same. It won’t be. Alberta may find itself blessed to have a government caucus so infused with youth. The new government will have to be heavy on experimenting, managing risk, failing early and often (and at lower cost), and exploring as-yet-unrealized competencies and situational realities.

For example, the oilsands are a stranded asset. The owners of stranded assets are generally the last to recognize that their assets are stranded. The incoming government is going to have to wrench Alberta in a different direction, which many of the province’s reputational leaders — and the former government — would have been unable to do.

I am not predicting that the new government will be successful, although I want and expect it to be. But I am excited by the election results. I am hopeful. I wish the new legislative assembly — all its members — well.

David King is a former MLA (1971-1986) and a former minister of Education and minister of Technology, Research and Telecommunications.