Former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney launches campaign for Liberal leadership

After months of speculation about his future, former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney launched his campaign Thursday to replace Justin Trudeau as Liberal leader.

Carney, 59, launched his campaign to take the reins of the ruling party at the Edmonton-area hockey rink, where he learned to skate as a boy while growing up on the Prairies.

“I’m doing this because Canada is the best country in the world, but it could be even better,” Carney told the crowd of supporters.

The Harvard-educated Carney said he has the economic skills needed to lead Canada through a period of economic uncertainty as the country stares at President-elect Donald Trump and the threat of tariffs on all our goods.

Carney played an important role in two G7 economies.

After his time at Harvard and later Oxford University in the United Kingdom, Carney began his career as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs, based in New York, before returning to Canada to work as a senior official in the Federal Ministry of Finance.

In an appointment that some saw as a shock at the time, Carney was named governor of the Bank of Canada in 2008.

As head of the central bank, Carney helped steer the country through the 2008-09 recession – an economic catastrophe that was not as bad in Canada as elsewhere.

Unlike in the United States, no Canadian banks failed under Carney’s watch. He aggressively cut interest rates to shore up an economy teetering on the brink, which some analysts say helped save the country from ruin.

Carney was later selected as governor of the Bank of England during a turbulent period for the United Kingdom as it dealt with Brexit and the resulting economic fallout.

During an appearance on Liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith’s podcast last year, Carney said he was considering a jump into politics because the Conservatives, who are frontrunners, are “leading in the polls” but are a party that is run by someone “who doesn’t do that.” understand the economy.

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre described Carney as a Trudeau-like Liberal who supports a carbon tax and will pursue job-killing policies if elected.