Tories’ minister of political liability a ghost during campaign
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 27/09/2023 (742 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
Where is Health Minister Audrey Gordon and what has the Progressive Conservative party done with her?
The PC candidate for Southdale has been conspicuously absent from the spotlight since the election was called on Sept. 5. Several cabinet ministers, including PC candidates Rochelle Squires (Riel), Obby Khan (Fort Whyte), Jon Reyes (Waverley), Kevin Klein (Kirkfield Park), Kelvin Goertzen (Steinbach), Scott Johnston (Assiniboia) and more have been featured regularly in campaign announcements since the writ was dropped. But not Gordon. She is nowhere to be found.
Officially, the party’s position is that she is too busy knocking on doors to make campaign announcements. All candidates are busy knocking on doors, including Squires, Johnston, Klein and other PC candidates who are seeking re-election in hotly contested ridings.

MIKE DEAL / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES
Health Minister Audrey Gordon, also the PC candidate for Southdale, has been conspicuously absent from the spotlight since the election was called on Sept. 5.
The real reason the party has kept Gordon away from the cameras is because her two-year tenure as health minister has been a disaster. Party strategists are keeping her out of sight because she is a political liability. Gordon is a constant reminder of the Tories’ gaffes in health-care and the erosion of public trust that grew under her watch.
Not all of the Tories’ failings in health can be blamed on Gordon. Far from it. Those began long before she was appointed health minister in August 2021 by former premier Brian Pallister. They began with funding cuts to hospitals in 2017 and a poorly implemented health-care reform plan that drove hundreds of front-line professionals into early retirement or the private sector. Mismanagement continued under Premier Heather Stefanson, who served as health minister for seven months in 2021 (when 57 ICU patients were airlifted out of Manitoba during the COVID-19 pandemic because hospitals didn’t have the capacity to treat them here).
Not all of the Tories’ failings in health can be blamed on Gordon. Far from it. Those began long before she was appointed health minister in August 2021 by former premier Brian Pallister.
It got worse under Gordon, in large part because of her incompetence. When surgeons from Grace Hospital wrote the minister last November to raise concerns about a lack of basic medical services at the facility, Gordon at first denied she saw the letter. When she finally admitted she read it, she had no solutions to address the concerns raised, even months later.
When a report commissioned by Manitoba Health in 2022 found widespread human resource problems within the health-care system (and provided recommendations on how to solve them), Gordon said she didn’t read the report. She could not explain why her department cancelled the second phase of the probe, which was supposed to delve deeper into issues such as staff burnout and poor communication between management and front-line workers. It’s as if Gordon had no idea what was going on in her own department.
Despite a severe shortage of doctors in Manitoba, the Tories cut funding for the province’s physician recruitment and retention fund and underspent it every year since 2017, including under Gordon. When asked why, she called it “misinformation.”
In March 2023, Gordon publicly blasted officials at Shared Health for not properly staffing the forensic nursing program at Health Sciences Centre (which provides treatment and support for victims of sexual assault), even though the staff shortages were caused by her government’s funding cuts.
It wasn’t the first time Gordon blamed bureaucrats for the mess in health-care. In April 2022 she called out senior health officials and demanded they “fix” the crisis in emergency departments, as if her government had nothing to do with it. Over a year later, the ER crisis still festers.
Gordon pledged in November to hire 2,000 more health-care workers with $200 million in new funding. However, every time she claimed to make progress on that file, she refused to release figures — despite being asked for them repeatedly — showing a net increase (or decrease) in overall staff.
Most of Gordon’s responses to serious questions about health-care issues have been gibberish, non-answers or obfuscation that show she is completely in over her head.
Most of Gordon’s responses to serious questions about health-care issues have been gibberish — non-answers or obfuscation that show she is completely in over her head. Her political staff routinely pull her away from reporters during scrums, after responding to questions for just a few minutes, to mitigate political damage.
It’s no wonder the Tories are keeping her away from the spotlight during this campaign.
But what does that say about Stefanson’s judgment as premier? Why did she leave such an incompetent minister in that portfolio for so long? Even after shuffling her cabinet in January, Stefanson kept Gordon in place and expressed confidence in her.
Even after shuffling her cabinet in January, Stefanson kept Gordon in place and expressed confidence in her.
Strategically, it may be smart to hide Gordon now, during an election campaign. But it’s also an acknowledgement of her failings. If it wasn’t, Stefanson and Gordon would be standing shoulder-to-shoulder throughout the campaign making announcements together.
Instead, the Tories have thrown Gordon under the bus. They have forced her to fend for herself in a riding she will almost certainly lose on Oct. 3.
tom.brodbeck@freepress.mb.ca

Tom Brodbeck is an award-winning author and columnist with over 30 years experience in print media. He joined the Free Press in 2019. Born and raised in Montreal, Tom graduated from the University of Manitoba in 1993 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics and commerce. Read more about Tom.
Tom provides commentary and analysis on political and related issues at the municipal, provincial and federal level. His columns are built on research and coverage of local events. The Free Press’s editing team reviews Tom’s columns before they are posted online or published in print – part of the Free Press’s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
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