Bernard Richard

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bernard Richard (born April 11, 1951 in Toronto, Ontario) is a lawyer and New Brunswick politician.

Richard first entered politics as a young man, running unsuccessfully in Shediac for the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick as a Parti Acadien candidate in the 1974 election. He went on to be involved in municipal politics in the village of Cap-Pélé.

He re-attempted entry into provincial politics in the 1991 election, this time as a Liberal, and won. He was re-elected in 1995, 1999 and 2003.

He was named to cabinet in 1995 and left in 1998 to contest the leadership of the Liberal Party. He was unsuccessful in his leadership bid and was returned to cabinet by Camille Thériault who was the victor in the contest. Richard managed to be re-election by the largest margin of any candidate in the 1999 election, despite his party suffering a massive defeat.

When Thériault resigned as leader in 2001, Richard briefly considered another run but instead became interim leader. When Shawn Graham became leader in 2002, Richard was made house leader and finance critic, two key roles in opposition. Richard maintained these roles after the 2003 election.

The Progressive Conservative government of Bernard Lord had won a bare majority in 2003, winning 28 of 55 seats and were anxious to strengthen their position. After first attempting to convince a Liberal to sit as speaker and then offering cabinet positions and other appointments to several Liberals, Richard accepted the post of provincial ombudsman, thus resiging his seat and increasing the Tory majority to 28/54 for the ensuing year before a by-election was held.

Provincial Government of Camille Thériault
Cabinet Post
Predecessor	Office	Successor
Bernard Thériault	Minister of Education (1998-1999)	Elvy Robichaud

Provincial Government of Ray Frenette
Cabinet Post
Predecessor	Office	Successor
himself in McKenna government	Minister of Education (1997-1998)	Bernard Thériault

Provincial Government of Frank McKenna
Cabinet Posts (2)
Predecessor	Office	Successor
Jim Lockyer	Minister of Education (1997)	himself in Frenette government
Paul Duffie	Minister of Justice and Attorney General (1997 (acting))	Jim Lockyer
Special Cabinet Responsibilities
Predecessor	Title	Successor
none	Minister of State for Intergovernmental and Aborginal Affairs (1995-1997) designation only used once	none

Preceded by Camille Thériault	Opposition Leader in the New Brunswick Legislature 2001-2002	Succeeded by Shawn Graham
	Leader of the New Brunswick Liberal Party 2001-2002 (interim)

Preceded by Marcelle Mersereau

Chair of the Liberal caucus 2002-2003

Succeeded by Scott Targett