Heather Stefanson's successful bid to lead the Manitoba Progressive Conservatives and take the premier's chair follows a lifetime in and around politics that started as a young girl.
She was the establishment candidate in the contest to replace former premier Brian Pallister, who stepped down from the top job last month. In results announced Saturday, Stefanson edged former member of Parliament Shelly Glover.
She studied political science at university and later worked for Mila Mulroney when Brian Mulroney was prime minister. She worked for the federal agriculture minister and, after the Tories lost the 1993 federal election, became an investment adviser. She was suspended at one point when she was found to have made trades during a period in which she had not kept up her credentials.
Her brief time in the health portfolio coincided with Manitoba's worst days of the COVID-19 pandemic. Stefanson had been touted as a possible leadership candidate in previous races, but she said she did not jump in because her children were young. They are now grown and Stefanson felt good about saying yes to people who asked her to run this time.
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