You know as Premier Andrew Furey gets set to ride into the political sunset, I am reminded that he is the first premier since Confederation that I NEVER interviewed. All the rest had been part of my working journalism career. I knew them all. There is a lesson there somewhere, but I don’t know what it is

I watched premiers come and go, these “first ministers” as they are called. There were some great people in that group. Some were Liberals and some were Conservatives. They weren’t all equal. Some were better than others. Some of them had a sharp vision of where they wanted our province to go. Others, however, were just politicians and nothing more. All of them though had one thing in common. As flawed as some of them might have been, they ALL loved our province.

Now the departing Andrew Furey gets my vote for being one of the top two premiers in our province’s history since Confederation. He came to the post with nothing in it for himself except a desire to serve. Andrew certainly didn’t need a job. He was a surgeon. He was more than that really because he had distinguished himself by taking his skills as a doctor to that most troubled nation that is Haiti. Dr. Furey put together a team of medical people from Newfoundland that went down to Haiti and did what it could to relieve the suffering of the Haitian people. That country was on the edge of lawlessness. The medical people didn’t work for glory or for money. They did it because it was the right thing to do.

When it became impossible to continue in Haiti due to unrest, Andrew Furey returned to Newfoundland and Labrador and once again dedicated himself to public service. This time it was in the political arena. He was, as you know, from a well-connected political family in Newfoundland. As Premier he faced a number of challenges. One of those great challenges was our health care system where he had to struggle to cut the “Gordian knot” of trying to provide decent health care to people in a geographical area that had been settled in the search for resources whether from the land or the sea. In other words, towns were scattered all over the place. That health care battle continues.

We are now in the middle of a trade war that is still unfolding with the United States. Andrew Furey has already played a leading role in that on the Canadian side. He is an excellent spokesperson for “the provinces,” although his time at the helm is now only short.

One area that may be Andrew Furey’s ultimate monument is the agreement with Quebec on the reworking of the hated Churchill Falls contract. It marked a major victory for Furey and the Liberals, so he is not being driven from office so-to-speak, but rather is leaving on a high note. That doesn’t happen too often. We have seen lots of premiers hit the road when the going gets tough, but it seems that Andrew Furey really just wants to have a life that is closer to his family and to his chosen profession, which is medicine.

I wish Andrew Furey well. He was a smart fellow who did his best and left us in a better place in Newfoundland and Labrador than when he came in. You can’t ask for more than that really from a politician.

You can contact Jim Furlong at [email protected]