OTTAWA – An upcoming Federal cabinet shuffle has been announced in response to several ministers claiming to have missed key information contained in official government memos addressed directly to them, though the Liberal government has clarified that they did not know reading was the thing you were supposed to do with memos.
“I sorta thought it was more like a morning email newsletter,” said Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino, who was sent a memo regarding the transfer of serial killer Paul Bernardo months before it occurred, but claimed he never received it. “You get sent one every morning and some mornings you maybe give it a read on the toilet, but most of the time you just delete it.”
“Looking back, I’m glad they didn’t follow my requests to unsubscribe. That would’ve looked really bad,” added Mendicino.
“Well I guess that explains the dinging I used to hear all day when I was Minister,” said former Public Safety Minister Bill Blair, who admitted he thought his government issued secure BlackBerry was an order pager from the Ottawa Jack Astors to tell him when his wings were ready for pickup.
“I just thought if something was important enough someone would print out a hard copy in size 32 and leave it on my desk with a bright post-it note and a little treat to reward me for reading it,” said Blair, who claimed he never received multiple memos from CSIS on foreign interference in Canadian federal elections.
“Last time I checked, it’s not the job of a Minister to read every last little missive in their inbox, it’s to, well…um….” trailed off Blair, who is now the President of the Privy Council, whatever that is.
“I thought I was just being cc’d out of courtesy,” explains former Defence Minister Harjit Singh.
“You get all these bummer memos saying ‘hey, all these Afghan translators and soldiers who helped Canadian forces are going to be brutally slaughtered by the Taliban we need to urgently evacuate them,’ and it’s like ok thanks for looping me in I guess not sure what the point of telling me this is other than ruining my day,” added Singh, who said that during the fall of Afghanistan he got so tired of his inbox being flooded with neggy vibes he panicked and threw his phone in a blender.
Off the record, other ministers expressed surprise that they had a separate work email they were supposed to be checking this whole time.
“I logged in for the first time today to 90000 unread emails, some of which were marked URGENT and IMPORTANT. Whoopsie, talk about egg on my face,” said one minister.
“Did you know there are 3 tabs in Gmail?” added another. I was just looking at the messages in the primary tab, but apparently there are 2 whole other tabs. They should really tell you that when you sign in.”
With the clarification now in place, the government says they are experimenting with different enforcement methods to ensure ministers read their memos, issuing kindergarten style morning checklists wherein ministers will have to confirm they have read their memos, are wearing pants, and have brushed their teeth before they’re let into chambers.
At press time, Trudeau came to the defense of his ministers, saying he too had missed a series of important memos from various ministries and departments. Specifically, Trudeau admitted to missing the memo on the housing crisis, cost of living crisis, healthcare crisis, education crisis, drug crisis, mental health crisis, employment crisis, military readiness crisis, and electoral reform, and said that now that he has been made aware of these very new and previously unknown issues for the very first time he was going to get right on it.
