Cardy says other ministers frustrated with Higgs should quit, too

Former education minister Dominic Cardy says he hopes other frustrated members of the Progressive Conservative cabinet will consider quitting like he did.

Cardy said he was not the only minister who had a problem with Premier Blaine Higgs's leadership style.

"I know that this is certainly the experience of other folks in cabinet, in other departments," Cardy said on Information Morning Fredericton.

"There is simply pressure based on what the premier is feeling on that day, standing in the way of getting what he wants done in government." 

In a subsequent interview Friday, Cardy said he hopes those ministers will think about how to register their objections.

"All you really have in politics in the end is you've won a seat, you're there, you get to make decisions. You have to decide where your values and principles align with the direction that you've been given," he said.

Cardy responds to Higgs’s comments on resignation

2 years ago

Duration 3:41

Dominic Cardy says he'd decided before Blaine Higgs's cabinet shuffle that he would resign as education minister

"If you feel you're being pushed over the lines, I hope that others would take the steps that they think are appropriate." 

Cardy made the comments Friday morning before the PC caucus met and voted to expel him. That means he'll now sit as an independent member of the legislature.

"As a group we found your conduct and your actions most notably over the last few days to be inexcusable," Higgs said in a letter to Cardy released to the news media. 

Cardy resigned Thursday with a scathing two-page letter to Higgs that accused him of meddling in decisions, ignoring data and evidence, and impulsive decision-making he compared to "a wrecking ball."

He said the premier replaced elected health authority boards with appointed trustees in July without consulting his cabinet or caucus.

Higgs has taken the same approach in deciding to rush the implementation of a recommendation to eliminate French immersion by next September, Cardy said.

"You have a premier who often talks about intentionally creating chaos as a way to catalyze change. That may work in some contexts in the private sector but it can be pretty disastrous in the public sector."

Higgs acknowledged Thursday he was looking for quick action on those issues.

He told reporters that he informed Cardy in a meeting he would be shuffling him out of cabinet and that Cardy already had a resignation letter drafted.

But Cardy disputed that version of events Friday morning, saying he took the initiative to resign in his meeting with the premier.

"I said 'I think it's time for us to part ways,'" Cardy said.

Higgs's letter to Cardy expelling him from the PC caucus called the letter "vindictive and misleading."

The former minister, a former provincial NDP leader first elected as a Progressive Conservative MLA in 2018, confirmed Higgs's assertion that he has threatened to resign from cabinet several times before. 

Each time, Cardy said, he managed to convince the premier and his cabinet colleagues "to move in my direction" enough to stay in cabinet.

He said Friday before the caucus vote to expel him that he had no plans to resign his seat and would remain an MLA and vote in a way consistent with the party's philosophy. 

Higgs said Thursday he will ask the PC caucus at the legislature to expel Cardy, which would force him to sit as an independent MLA.

Cardy said he wants the chance to make his case for staying to the caucus and hopes any vote on expelling him will be by secret ballot.

"It is usually not the premier's prerogative to make those calls," he said.

Expelled or not, he said he has no plans to resign his seat before the next election and would support the Higgs government's legislation that conforms to its election commitments.

"I was elected as a PC MLA for Fredericton West-Hanwell and I'm going to continue to do my job based on that," Cardy said.

"I will continue to sit and represent the values and the platform that I was elected to implement and vote accordingly. I've got no plans on going anywhere." 

He said he would not run for the PC leadership if Higgs retires and has no interest in running for the federal Conservatives.

He also ruled out joining the Liberal or Green caucuses, saying he opposes floor-crossing on principle.

Liberal Leader Susan Holt tweeted Friday morning that her party wouldn't welcome Cardy even if he were interested.

"We discussed it as a caucus and agreed it was not something we will pursue," she said.

And Green Party Leader David Coon said the only way a sitting MLA could join the Greens would be to resign and run as a Green candidate in a byelection.

Whatever his status in the legislature, Cardy said now that he is free of the requirement for cabinet solidarity, he'll continue to raise his concerns about Higgs. 

"Clearly there's a much broader world outside the four walls of that building, and as an elected official, it's my job to talk about public policy and issues and my perspective on them," he said.

"MLAs are elected to use their judgment to analyze the issues of the day and I'm going to continue to do that in my new role the same way I did in my old role."