New Opposition Leader Wayne Furbert has grown up in politics. is great-great-uncle, Ernest Furbert, was the first black Member of Parliament in Bermuda, elected from Hamilton Parish in 1933.

Mr. Furbert, 49, of Brown Estate Road, Hamilton Parish was educated in accounting and finance at St. Mary's University, in Halifax, Nova Scotia from 1980 to 1983 and took a B.Sc. and B.Ed. in accounting and education at the University of Toledo, Ohio in 1979.

In 1991 he became a Certified Public Accountant and received a Masters in E-Business from the University of Phoenix in 2003.

Mr. Furbert was elected as UBP Deputy Leader in September 17, 2004 having spent over a decade in Parliament, being first elected to the House of Assembly in 1993 for Hamilton West.

In 2001, Mr. Furbert was elected as the eighteenth Chairman of the United Bermuda Party (UBP) and was elected back to the House in 2003.

Despite being the new Opposition Leader, Mr. Furbert has already had a taste of being a Government Minister.

For three years, from 1995 to January 1998, he was the Minister of Transport and saw an increase in airport revenue from $4 million to $7 million, and renovating the arrival and departure halls including new retail concessions.

He said he also instigated the formation of a Transport Authority and enhanced the airport and shipping registries to increase revenue.

From January 1998 to November 1998, Mr. Furbert was the Minister of Health and Family Services with a total 1998 to 1999 budget of $130 million. He said his accomplishments within this Ministry included improved conditions for seniors by increasing the minimum subsidy to those who could not afford the basic necessities of life, putting in place a policy to assist working families who could not afford day care for their children, improved conditions and allotments for adopted children,bringing forward legislation to protect children as well as tough legislation on impaired driving and renovating homes for families.

He lost his Hamilton West seat in the 1998 election ? the same year he started Paradiso cafe on Reid Street.

In addition to Paradiso, Mr. Furbert has started and owned three companies including Genesis Accounting & Management Services in 2000, he said.

He provides accounting service to some small businesses and is a director of several local and Exempt companies.

From 1983 to 1991 he served as Chairman of Finance at the King Edward VII Memorial Hospital and from 1991 to 1993 was Chairman of the Road Safety Council.

Leaders of Tomorrow ? a global initiative that addresses the ever-increasing challenges of poor and disadvantaged young people ? saw him as a member from 1989 to 1993.

He is a Member of the California State Board, a Member of the American Institute of Chartered Accountancy, as well as the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Bermuda.

Honours included speaking at the House of Commons committee room in London, he said. He is married to Ulene and 21-year-old twins, Jasmine and J'von. Personal interests and hobbies include studying, singing and travel, he said.

He was awarded a medal for being the best marksman in the Bermuda Regiment.

His first job was at PricewaterhouseCoopers from 1979 to 1982, followed by Heddington Insurance and Richards, Francis & Francis until 1998. In 2000, Mr. Furbert got in political hot water by suggesting cutting congestion by banning all but the most highly placed expatriate workers from having cars.

And in 2001 BermudaTech foreman Wayne Furbert presented the workers' written concerns to then Works and Engineering Minister Alex Scott outside Parliament to protest a bidding process for the senior secondary school project.

Despite his unanimous vote by the UBP, in an unscientific poll on a Limey in Bermuda web-site of who would be the best leader of the UBP, Mr. Furbert ended up in twelfth place, with a mere 2 percent. Out of the 140 votes cast the poll was nominally won by Shadow Attorney General Trevor Moniz.

However, the fact that Mr. Moniz acquired 14 of his 24 votes within the space of a couple of hours made web-site officials suspicious of a co-ordinated vote for Mr. Moniz.