Minister quits as legislature condemns N.B. premier’s LGBTQ policy change

Progressive Conservative minister Dorothy Shephard resigned from New Brunswick’s cabinet Thursday, moments after the legislature voted in favour of an opposition Liberal motion on LGBTQ students in provincial schools.

Shephard, the MLA for Saint John-Lancaster, handed a letter to Premier Blaine Higgs just moments after the extraordinary vote.

“I can no longer remain in cabinet,” said the handwritten letter. “I resign from cabinet effective immediately.”

Her resignation as minister of social development came at the end of an emotional, and often personal, two-hour debate on the Liberal motion.

Her decision also intensifies a political furore surrounding Premier Blaine Higgs, who ordered a review of a policy that aimed to protect LGBTQ students in the province’s schools.

Shephard walked out of the legislature during Higgs’s speech on the motion, but she returned later to join five other PC ministers and MLAs to vote with the opposition.

Fighting back tears, Shephard said she quit not only over the LGBTQ policy but also over Higgs’s overall management style.

“It’s not just about Policy 713. I resigned because there is no process,” she said. “Cabinet and caucus are routinely dismissed. I have been struggling with this since October 2021.”

Shephard was health minister at that time, helping lead the province’s COVID-19 response.

Opposition motion passes with support from PC bench

The initial version of the motion called on the Higgs government to reverse its changes to Policy 713, which sets minimum standards for safe, inclusive schools for LGBTQ students.

Education Minister Bill Hogan introduced changes June 7 that he said make it mandatory to get parental consent before even using the chosen name and pronoun of a child younger than 16 in class.

Dorothy Shephard resigns from cabinet

In a note addressed to the premier, the social development minister said, ‘I can no longer remain in your cabinet.’

The Liberals amended their motion to have it call for “full consultations” by child and youth advocate Kelly Lamrock, with a report due in August.

The six PC MLAs voted for that amendment and then for the amended motion itself, helping it pass 26-20.

Lamrock immediately announced on Twitter he will do the study.

“I am an officer of the Legislative Assembly. A vote of the majority of the House is binding upon me,” he said. “I will carry out the direction of the Legislative Assembly to the best of my abilities.”

Higgs would not commit to following whatever Lamrock recommends, after the majority vote for his study.

When it’s transphobic, you call it out as transphobic.” – Gail Costello, Pride in Education

“I’m looking at the majority of caucus that supported what our minister put forward, so I’m going to rely on him to look at who else he needs to talk to about how to implement the policy, how to engage parents, and we’ll allow that to unfold,” he said.

“We can’t let individual feelings in the legislature at this point … kind of overshadow the hundreds or probably thousands of parents and what is being identified as something that needs to be addressed.”

And if a child says no to involving their parents, they should be referred to a school psychologist or social worker to come up with a plan to include those parents, the minister said. 

The other Tories who broke ranks, along with Shephard, on the vote were ministers Jeff Carr, Daniel Allain and Trevor Holder and backbenchers Ross Wetmore and Andrea Anderson-Mason.

Whatever Lamrock decides won’t be binding on the Higgs government, but the vote represents a symbolic rejection of the premier’s approach to the issue.

Shephard plans to stay in PC caucus

Shephard told reporters that her friends had urged her to stay and advance her values within the government, but “there’s no accomplishing anything more in this cabinet so I’m ready to leave.”

She said she hoped to stay in the PC caucus.

Anderson-Mason said it was a shame Shephard had quit.

“She was an excellent minister. She was well positioned in the department of social development and I’m sure she will be missed very much,” she said.

“She certainly had a heart for that department and she worked incredibly hard for it and I know she had the respect of the staff.”

Anderson-Mason said she supported the amended Liberal motion because it reflected the consensus that had been reached in the PC caucus last week: to seek Lamrock’s advice on Policy 713 and then follow it.

CBC News Explains: How did the New Brunswick government change Policy 713?

New Brunswick’s Department of Education made several changes to a policy designed to protect LGBTQ students, affecting sections on self-identification, extracurricular activities and washrooms.

Instead, the caucus was denied the chance to see what Lamrock had said, she explained.

All six MLAs who voted for the motion signed a statement last week expressing “extreme disappointment” with the “lack of process and transparency” on the Policy 713 review.

The other two ministers who signed it, Arlene Dunn and Jill Green, were not in the house for the vote.

Gender dysphoria ‘trendy,’ says Higgs

Higgs was complaining during his debate speech about what he called a lack of openness to the role of parents, when Shephard got up and left.

The premier claimed gender dysphoria — a medically recognized diagnosis when the gender someone feels or experiences is different than the one they were born with — is becoming “popular and trendy.”

“We have a situation that’s growing because there’s such acceptance that this is fine,” he said — a comment that earned him swift condemnation.

Gail Costello of Pride in Education said Higgs’s speech was offensive, like many of the other comments he’s made in recent weeks.

“They don’t like it when we say it’s transphobic, but when it’s transphobic, you call it out as transphobic,” she said.

Higgs said during the debate that Policy 713 “kind of slid into the system” unnoticed under his watch in 2020 and only came to light when people began hearing about drag queen story times in libraries.

The trend was contributing to “an erosion of the family role in child’s upbringing,” Higgs said, criticizing activists whom he said are trying to make such policies “unquestionable.”

Liberal Leader Susan Holt accused Higgs of “spreading hate” in his speech, but said she was pleased the vote and Lamrock’s consultations created another opportunity to revisit and strengthen Policy 713.

“I believe that the child and youth advocate will put forward a clear, strong, well-worded recommendation for Policy 713 that the house will be able to adopt, hopefully with unanimity,” she told reporters.

Green Leader David Coon said Higgs’s support in his caucus and in his party was clearly “evaporating” and he should resign.