B.C. cabinet shuffle follows Gordon Campbell's usual pattern

Premier Gordon Campbell's cabinet shuffle  had echoes of a pre-election shuffle in 2004, which  resulted in  a noticeable shortage of women and visible-minority ministers.

It's still to early to tell, however, if he will end up alienating  female voters  and  Metro Vancouver's growing number of nonwhite voters.

Today, the  premier boosted five Caucasian Liberal MLAs into cabinet, including two women,  but kept two minority MLAs, Dave Hayer and Richard Lee, in parliamentary secretary positions.

Hayer, who represents Surrey-Tynehead,  and Lee, who represents Burnaby North,  have been in the legislature  since 2001. Three new cabinet ministers--Joan McIntyre (minister of state for  intergovernmental relations), Iain Black (minister of labour and citizens' services), and Mary Polak (minister of healthy living and sport)--are first-term MLAs.

There are already two minority MLAs in Campbell's 23-member cabinet: Attorney General Wally Oppal and Ida Chong,  minister of technology, trade and economic development and minister responsible for the Asia-Pacific Initiative.

There are five women in  Campbell's 23-member cabinet.  Two former ministers, Carole Taylor and Olga Ilich, were dropped after they announced that they wouldn't run for the legislature in 2009.

This isn't the first time that Campbell has created a white-male-dominated cabinet going into an election. In 2004, Campbell shuffled his cabinet, appointing 19 Caucasian ministers. Of his 10 MLAs of South Asian and Chinese descent at the time, none were given senior portfolios and three received the more junior minister of state positions.

The 2004 cabinet shuffle led to criticism from a former close ally of Campbell's, ex-NPA councillor  Tung Chan, as well as from the former chief commissioner of the British Columbia Human Rights Commission, Mary-Woo Sims.