Q&A: From suits to scrubs, Premier Furey looks back at his time leading N.L.
New Liberal leader will be announced on May 3
Premier Andrew Furey traded his scrubs for a suit and tie in 2020 to help lead Newfoundland and Labrador through the COVID-19 pandemic.
Four and a half years later, he's decided to return to the place he started: the operating room.
In an interview this week with CBC News, Furey talked about his achievements, lessons learned, and passing the torch to the person who'll be selected to fill his shoes in the Liberal leadership race.
The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
You became the premier in August of 2020 in the midst of a pandemic. What is your legacy?
I hope my legacy is one of pace of change and transformation. When I started, we could figure out where your Uber driver was in New York, but we didn't know where all the ambulances were here in Newfoundland and Labrador. Now, there is one ambulance service for the whole province, and a central command where we know the location of all the ambulances. Virtual care is in place. Family care teams — a brand new concept. We did the rate mitigation deal. Credit rating agencies have all given us an upgrade. We've created a future fund and cut the deficit down.
Our population increased. There's Churchill Falls. We're moving into the hydroelectric space and ensuring that we have a transformative deal for the people of Newfoundland and Labrador, while also harnessing other green electricity with respect to hydrogen and wind potential here.
Repatriating our unknown soldier was something that was incredibly spiritual for me, and I do believe for the province. Participating as the next of kin, it changed me as a person. Churchill Falls didn't change me as a person. Rate mitigation didn't change me as a person. That changed me as a person, and to be able to participate in helping heal that century-old wound for Newfoundland and Labrador will be something that I'll be proud of and hopefully helps define my tenure and my legacy.
I want to talk a little bit about reflecting, and if you have any regrets during your time in the premier's office. What was your biggest challenge, or was there something that you wish you had handled differently?
Hindsight is 2020, and no politician is afforded the benefit of hindsight. That's why opposition is so easy. I can think of two immediately. I could have handled the relationship with Innu [Nation] in particular differently during the rate mitigation announcement and process. That was not done with any malice or malicious intent on my part. I assure you, I apologized to them and have tried to make it right, and I think I have made the relationship right. I should have phoned the grand chief at the time, and I take responsibility for that instead of downloading them to a minister or whoever. So that was a learned lesson. I think I became better for it.
The second thing is with respect to the crab protests last year. We were always willing and wanting to work with the people that are having issues. For whatever reason, it was directed at the government. Really, it's between the processors and the fishermen and the harvesters. That said, it got out of hand very quickly. That's despite my efforts to talk to some of the organizers. We have been fishing with Mr. Efford since this occurred, and we were always wanting to allow for more competition and some of the demands at the time that they requested, but had to do it in a logical and reasonable way; waiting for quotas, for example, in order to make those definitive decisions. I'm not sure what I would have done differently. But I do have regret that it escalated to the level that it did, if there was some way that I could have prevented it.
Your successor, who we know is going to be named John at this point, will be chosen this weekend. What do you see as the biggest challenge for them moving forward as the next premier?
I think the immediate challenge is the threat of tariffs and the uncertainty with respect to [U.S. President Donald] Trump. There is potentially a national unity issue lurking in the background. What makes Canada special is that we can have all these diverse and different views, different ideologies, but we unite as Canadians, and I hope that that doesn't bubble to the surface.
Then, there's taking the MOU to definitive agreements. All the process and structure is already set up in a responsible way, with lessons learned from Muskrat and lessons learned from Churchill Falls. Subsequently, the challenge and temptation would be to spend all that money. My challenge to whoever comes next is to be prudent and responsible with it. There's enough money to pay off debt, pay into the treasury with goods and services that people need right now and the future.
Speaking of the influence of down south, I noticed that once you announced your resignation, you seemed a little bit looser with your words, and you called the U.S. President Donald Trump "cracked." What was it like going to Washington and then trying to deal with the hostile administration?
Everybody thinks there is a master strategy or strategist, and there isn't. Canada's premiers met with senior White House officials in what I would describe as a very cold meeting. There were none of the normal pleasantries of normal Canadian-U.S. relations. Some of the premiers went in thinking the 51st state stuff is nonsense, although I've maintained from Day 1 that I think that Trump's been serious. The officials said Trump is not messing around. They were very clear. Trump is not speaking in tongues. What he says is what he means.
This president is different from Trump #1. There's one decision maker in that White House, and it's him. I do think he has an imperialistic agenda. He's an older president who may or may not see a third term, heaven forbid, but he wants a legacy. A legacy in his mind, I think, is an expansion of the territory of the United States, whether that's Panama, Greenland or Canada. We need to be on guard for that.
I handle the virus that is pathological and biological. There's a different virus that the next premier has [to do deal with] that's equally threatening.
The province is dealing with a large deficit that's projected at $372 million right now. The Churchill Falls deal is underway, but at this point, it's not set in stone. It's still just an MOU. What does the next premier need to do to keep the province on track financially?
I think we set up a good path. When I started, we had the worst credit rating in the country. We had rate mitigation hanging over our head, which wasn't particularly built into the deficit or debt.
We tackled those in a very calm and strategic manner. I said let's do what no other premier could do and bring net profit interest and Hibernia back so that Newfoundlanders and Labradorians' rates don't double.
I had the benefit of the disruption of COVID. We didn't let that moment of disruption slip through our fingers. We were creative in establishing the future fund. Imagine where we would be if someone in the 2000s had established the Future Fund? Some former premiers were running $2-billion surpluses. If they just put a tiny bit aside and we would have been a much different place. Anyone could do that in easy times, but it takes courage to do it in troubled times.
Now, we have it set up and it's $400 million. We're making more money on that than we're spending on the debt.
If you look at the geopolitical tensions that exist around the world currently, we have access to titles. They're talking about pipelines going across six provinces. We don't need pipelines. Our oil and gas product, our fishery product, our forestry product, our critical minerals can go anywhere in the world. So the U.S. doesn't want it? We'll send it somewhere else with minimal disruption.
If you look at our deficit compared to the others across the country, it's prudent and responsible. It's not the largest by any stretch, and the Churchill Falls deal will and should ultimately right the fiscal ship, combined with making sure we're saving on our non-renewable resources and future fund.
You could easily do one-third debt repayment, one-third future funding, and one-third third treasury and pay down the debt fairly quickly. That was the thought if I was going to be here, and I know that was the thought in the current two ministers who were running. I hope they continue with that vision.
What's next for you?
Well, I'm going back to the operating room, and I'm going back to serving the people of the province in a different capacity, but who knows after that? We'll see where life's adventure takes me. I've always been interested in personal and professional growth, whether that's in the operating room or outside with Team Broken Earth and creating national charities like a Dollar a Day [Foundation] or in business, frankly. So I don't think my future adventure will be exclusively limited to the operating room.
Do you see any future at all in politics? Do you think you'd come back here?
Well, we'll see. I mean, we're exiting now for family reasons, but family circumstances change as children grow up. And there's always been a strong call to serve the public in my family and in me. If that opportunity arises in the future, it's certainly one that I'd be interested in entertaining.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
With files from Jen White
