ER doctor takes back Winnipeg riding from Tories

Doug Eyolfson will again leave the emergency room and head to Parliament Hill after taking down Marty Morantz, the Conservative incumbent in Winnipeg West.

“In 2019 when I lost, I vowed that I was going to be back one day, and I never really gave that up,” Eyolfson, 61, told the Free Press at his campaign party event at the Portage Avenue Holiday Inn.

“I always kept working at this while doing my day job, and I had a feeling that one day it was going to happen again. It was worth every moment.”

The doctor, who often spoke to media on the state of Manitoba health care during the COVID-19 pandemic, was the MP for the area for one term, from 2015 to 2019, but lost to Morantz in both of the subsequent elections.

Over at Morantz’s campaign office, the mood was gloomy as polling results rolled in. Supporters, many of whom were young, wiped away tears.

Morantz congratulated Eyolfson and said he’s excited to see what the new iteration of the Conservative party could achieve, but he is done with politics.

“I can’t see myself running for office again,” he said.

“I’ve had a very good career. I ran in five general elections (and) I’ve won three of them … I think I’m going out a winner.”

Morantz and Eyolfson appeared to take different approaches on Election Day. A small convoy of trucks and sign-twirlers on sidewalks carried blue placards that called on voters to cast their ballot for Morantz. Eyolfson stuck to the bus benches and lawn signs that had been in place all month.

Morantz, 62, a lawyer before entering politics, was the city councillor for Charleswood-Tuxedo-Westwood from 2014 to 2018, serving on then-mayor Brian Bowman’s executive policy committee.

In 2023, the name of the riding was changed from Charleswood-St. James-Assiniboia-Headingley to Winnipeg West and gained Conservative-leaning Tuxedo and the rural municipality of Rosser.

The change was made to improve voter parity and balance the scales tilted due to low population growth in the original riding compared to elsewhere in Manitoba.

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca