Pressure from Jim Irving led former premier David Alward to switch natural resources ministers, says Bruce Northrup, speaking for the first time about how he lost the portfolio in a cabinet shuffle four years ago. The shuffle came months after Irving, the co-CEO of J.D. Irving Ltd., sent a frankly worded letter to the Progressive Conservative premier, expressing frustration that Northrup seemed opposed to increasing how much Crown land should be made available to industry. …In a province where about half the wood supply comes from publicly owned Crown land, Northrup’s story raises questions about how much control industry has over government decision-making. At the time, the province was under pressure from J.D. Irving to decrease the amount of Crown conservation land protected from timber harvesting to 23 per cent from 28 per cent.