Mark Carney says Harper "asked me if I would be his finance minister in 2012"

In a 2025 CBC interview during the Liberal Party leadership contest, Mark Carney said Stephen Harper had raised the finance portfolio with him in 2012. Harper’s new memoir, released Tuesday, gives his account: he says he proposed a government position to Carney, then Bank of Canada governor, but that Jim Flaherty held the finance post at the time; Harper writes he told Carney he would be the top choice if the job became vacant. Harper also says he worried Carney might seek the Liberal leadership and that an offer could either bring him into government or push him to rule out a partisan bid. According to Harper, Carney weighed the offer, chose not to enter electoral politics, and soon left for the Bank of England. The passage addresses an episode Harper says has occasionally appeared in media coverage.