Right in the centre - PC Leadership races - a review
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- Published on Thursday, May 15, 2025
By Ken Waddell
Neepawa Banner & Press
The Manitoba Progressive Conservative (PC) Party has historically struggled over a number of issues include organizational structure and leadership. This column deals with the leadership issue.
Over my lifetime, there have been a number of PC Party of Manitoba Leadership races. I was too young to really remember how the election of Duff Roblin unfolded as it was in 1954 when I was only about six years old.
When Roblin resigned in 1967, a leadership race was declared and Walter Weir of Minnedosa won against Sterling Lyon, Dr. George Johnson and Stewart McLean. It was a delegate selection convention with 466 votes cast in the first round of voting. It was hotly contested as I witnessed the convention having been recruited by Dr. Johnson’s daughter, Janice, later to become Senator Johnson. Janice and I sat on the University of Manitoba Student Council (UMSU) together. Walter Weir was defeated in the 1969 provincial election by Ed Schreyer and formed the first NDP government in Manitoba. A leadership convention was held in 1971 where Sidney Spivak defeated Harry Enns in a delegated convention by 261 votes to 251. A total of 476 votes.
In 1975, another delegated convention was held where Sterling Lyon defeated Sydney Spivak 264-207, a total of 471 votes.
The 1983 leadership convention was delegated as well. It was a hotly contested event where on the first ballot Gary Filmon received 261 votes, Brian Ransom got 217 and Clayton Manness got 71.
The 2000 leadership convention gave Stuart Murray the leadership by acclamation as Darren Praznik withdrew from the race earlier.
The 2006 leadership convention was the first one-member-one vote leadership election. This concept had been presented and debated at numerous AGMs and the process was finally adopted for the 2006 leadership race. The results were Hugh McFadyen 6,091 votes, Ron Schuler 1,953 and Ken Waddell 1,069.
Brian Pallister was acclaimed in the 2012 leadership race.
The 2021 leadership race was also hotly contested with Heather Stefanson winning 8,405 votes to Shelley Glover at 8,042. Disagreement extended past voting day as Glover’s team contested the results in court but the court did not find in her favour.
The 2025 PC Manitoba leadership race was won by Obby Khan with 2,198.8 points over Wally Daudrich 2,163.2 points.
The 2025 leadership race used a weighted points per constituency system and while Khan won on points, Daudrich received 45 more total votes. The weighted system is similar to what has been used in the Conservative Party of Canada leadership races. The process has been highly debated with detractors saying it distorts a true one-member-one vote system. Proponents say it allows for better regional representation so as to avoid larger membership ridings from overwhelming the vote. I believe the system came about in the federal party level (CPC) at the insistence of former PC leader Peter MacKay when the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada merged with the Canadian Alliance Party (formerly Reform Party of Canada).
The one-member-one-vote system makes accessibility to voting much easier for all members. Many people are challenged financially or by location to travel to a delegate selection meeting or even more, to a leadership convention.
Going forward, there needs to be many discussions among PC Manitoba members and other people about the leadership selection issue and organizational issues.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this column are the writer’s personal views and are not to be taken as being the view of the newspaper staff.
