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Q: Do you consider yourself, at this point 35 years later, a controversial or polarizing figure in Saskatchewan?

A: I guess I do if you’re from the real sincere political left because we changed so much. The Blakeney (NDP) administration nationalized potash mines and others, which kicked out investment. We invited the pension funds and capital markets of the world to come in and invest. And the second thing was while the NDP were against the free trade model in North America, with the U.S. and Mexico, we were obviously the other way. We built and built and built — and that probably, politically, took the wind out of their sails. I’ve often said that if I would have been a CCF premier, I probably would have been very popular.

Q: One of the criticisms that was levelled in the wake of your appointment was the massive deficit your government ran up. When you look back, is there anything you would have done differently?

A: We had commodity prices (that were) low, interest rates high and we spent a lot of money building. And that doesn’t pay off, the building part, for a decade or two. People were losing their farms, losing their homes at 21 and 22 per cent interest rates. It was a crisis. And so we (agreed) to help farmers and homeowners, and that cost us money. But people wanted us to do that, and that’s why they elected us. Did we have a deficit because of it? Yes. Were they happy that we did it? Yes. Do they like to complain that we had a deficit? I guess so. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.