5 Liberals out as N.B. deputy ministers

Five top-ranking provincial government officials tied to the Liberal party were handed severance packages to leave office before Premier-designate David Alward's Tories come to power on Oct. 12.

Outgoing Premier Shawn Graham's Liberal cabinet met for the final time on Tuesday and approved the severance packages.

David Ferguson, the clerk of the executive council, who is the province's top bureaucrat, confirmed the severance packages.

Ferguson wouldn't provide the amounts but he said they're essentially the same as similar buyouts in 1999 and 2006.

Some of those packages surpassed $100,000.

The departing deputy ministers are:

• Bernard Theriault: chief of staff of the premier's office
• Doug Tyler: deputy minister of strategic planning
• Maurice Robichaud: deputy minister of Communications New Brunswick
• Yvon LeBlanc: deputy minister of justice
• Dana Clendenning: president and chief executive officer of NB Liquor

Only politically-connected deputy ministers were released on Tuesday.

Alward has promised to reduce the number of departments in a shrunken cabinet. So there could be retirements among some of the provincial government's top mandarins.

The two parties continued their transition phases on Tuesday as the Liberals announced Greg Byrne, the outgoing minister of finance, would serve as the chief of staff in the new Liberal opposition office.

Byrne, who was defeated in his Fredericton-Lincoln riding on Sept. 27, was a lawyer before he was elected in 2006. He also served as the president of the Liberals.