Editing Allan MacEachen (section)

==Cabinet minister==
When [[Lester B. Pearson]] formed a Liberal government in 1963, he appointed MacEachen to [[Cabinet of Canada|cabinet]] as [[Minister of Labour (Canada)|Minister of Labour]]. It was the beginning of a lengthy career in cabinet in which MacEachen served in several portfolios under Prime Ministers Pearson, [[Pierre Trudeau]] and [[John Turner]]. Over the course of his career, MacEachen held the following portfolios: Labour, [[Minister of National Health and Welfare (Canada)|National Health and Welfare]], [[Minister of Manpower and Immigration (Canada)|Manpower and Immigration]], [[President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada|Privy Council]], [[Secretary of State for External Affairs (Canada)|External Affairs]], and [[Minister of Finance (Canada)|Finance]].

In addition to his ministerial responsibilities, MacEachen served as [[Government House Leader]] on three occasions and became the first [[Deputy Prime Minister of Canada]] in 1977 under Trudeau, a post that was held whenever Trudeau was in office until the latter retired.

In his memoirs, published in 1993, Trudeau wrote that MacEachen "had a very good strategic sense, both in and out of Parliament, and he lived and breathed politics." For Trudeau, he "was always a source of shrewd advice" and "was the kind of man I respected, because he had no ulterior motives; he said what he thought, and the reasons he would give were always his real reasons."<ref>{{cite book |title=Memoirs |first=Pierre Elliott |last=Trudeau |publisher=[[McClelland & Stewart]] |location=[[Toronto]] |date=1993 |isbn=0-7710-8588-5 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/memoirs00trud/page/176 176]–177 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/memoirs00trud}}</ref>

In 1968 MacEachen contested the leadership of the Liberal Party but did not do well, largely because there was a second Nova Scotian on the ballot. He was courted to run for leader again in 1984 but opted to support [[John Turner]], the eventual winner.

In 1979, when the Liberals lost the election to [[Joe Clark]]'s [[Progressive Conservative Party of Canada|Conservatives]], MacEachen served as interim [[Leader of the Opposition (Canada)|Leader of the Opposition]] when Trudeau announced his retirement from politics. Trudeau's short-lived retirement ended with the defeat of Clark's government in a vote of confidence of [[1979 Canadian federal budget|his budget]] and the Liberals' return to power with a majority government on February 18, 1980.

MacEachen took the role of Finance Minister and announced the [[National Energy Policy]] as part of his [[1980 Canadian federal budget|1980 budget]]. He also angered public sector unions in his [[1982 Canadian federal budget|1982 budget]] by imposing a [[incomes policy|wage restraint]] package dubbed "six and five," which limited wage increases to 6% and 5% for the next two years.<ref name=":LeaderPost">{{Cite web|date= 29 June 1982 |title=The Leader-Post|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=w9EjUEod0xMC&dat=19820629&printsec=frontpage&hl=fr|access-date=2020-06-17|website=news.google.com}}</ref> That was while double-digit interest rates and inflation were common.