Linda McIntosh

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Linda Laughlin McIntosh (born December 14, 1943) is a politician in Manitoba, Canada. She was a member of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba from 1990 to 1999, and a cabinet minister for most of this period.

Linda Laughlin was born in Montreal, Quebec, the child of a career military officer (RCAF), and was educated in Canada and Europe, attending eleven different schools during the course of her elementary and high school education. In 1960 she graduated from Royal George High School in Montreal and travelled to Manitoba (the province in which her parents were raised and to which they eventually retired) and began studies at St. John's College at the University of Manitoba. McIntosh graduated with honours from the Manitoba Teachers' College, Tuxedo Campus, in 1963.

She worked as a teacher and freelance commercial artist for several years, and was also a political commentator at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in 1985-86. McIntosh was elected as a school trustee in the Winnipeg region of St. James-Assiniboia in 1980, and served until 1989, becoming its first female chair in 1984. She was elected to serve as President of the Manitoba Association of School Trustees in the mid-eighties. In June 1988, she was hired as Special Assistant to Progressive Conservative leader Gary Filmon, who had become Manitoba's Premier the previous month.

McIntosh was herself elected to the Manitoba legislature in the provincial election of 1990, defeating incumbent Liberal Ed Mandrake by 1324 votes in the western Winnipeg riding of Assiniboia.

On February 5, 1991, she was named Minister of Cooperative, Consumer and Corporate Affairs, with responsibility for the Liquor Control Act. In those roles she had the Residential Tenancy Act re-written and established a Residential Tenancy Court which enabled landlords and tenants with disputes to have their issues resolved quickly and inexpensively without lengthy civil court battles.

McIntosh was appointed to the Provincial Treasury Board on January 14, 1992.

On September 10, 1993, she was transferred to the Ministry of Urban Affairs and Housing. In this portfolio she worked closely with then Winnipeg Mayor Susan Thompson on a wide variety of interprovincial issues such as the Shoal Lake aquaduct agreement and the Municipal/Provincial/Federal Infrastructure Agreements.

Her work in the Housing Department earned her public recognition from public housing tenants. McIntosh was easily re-elected in the provincial election of 1995, defeating Liberal Allen Green by 1130 votes. On May 9, 1995, she was appointed Minister of Education and Training. In this capacity, she was responsible for developing measurable standards for literacy and numeracy at three year intervals at grades 3, 6, 9, and 12. Mainly diagnostic in nature, these standards tests also counted for a portion of students' final marks at the upper levels of learning.

McIntosh felt that her most significant work was the undertaking of a two-year long Special Needs Study, culminating in recommendations, widely praised, which recommended how to best meet the challenges and opportunities of inclusivism; and how to create the most enabling learning experience for all students, in regular and special needs categories.

As Minister responsible for all post-secondary education, she created the Council on Post-Secondary Education to be responsible for co-ordinating efforts amongst Manitoba's Universities and Colleges, to better avoid duplication and overlap, and to ensure seamless movement from one level of learning to another throughout the province.

It was under McIntosh's tenure that the Mennonite University was established, and that a Task Force was established and completed recommendations on what needed to be done to arrange better opportunities for Apprenticeship and Trades training.

She increased the student representation on the Universities' Boards of Governors and approved the University of Manitoba's Student Union's Pathways to Excellence brief to the provincial government. Under her Tenure the Red River Community College expanded and was granted new nomenclature, becoming Red River College. She also imposed a number of surcharges for certain university categories in 1995 - 1996, which were regarded by some as particularly severe on foreign students, since foreign students would no longer be given a preferential tuition rate and would have to pay the same fees as Canadian students.

McIntosh was no stranger to controversy. Amongst many items which became the topic of public debate during her tenure as Education Minister was the whole question of patriotic exercises in schools. In 1998, school principals brought to her attention that the portion of the Manitoba Schools Act convcerning patriotic exercises was not being followed in many schools. McIntosh won the support of the Monarchists across the province, and the ire of Canadian republicans, when she sent out a memo to School Divisions reminding them that the Act was to be followed^{[citation needed]}.

It became a provincial controversy, with many complaining that semestered school timetables made such exercises difficult to successfully accomplish since not all students would be present for them. In one memorable moment during this controversy, the entire opposition NDP caucus stood and with great gusto sang all the verses of God Save the Queen in the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba.

MLA Doug Martindale (NDP, Burrows) said afterwards that the performance was a "serenade" for Minister McIntosh. The Lieutenant-Governor of Manitoba, who was present in the House during this escapade, wisely stood silently at attention during the "serenade" and afterwards made no comment^{[citation needed]}.

In the final cabinet shuffle of Filmon's government on February 5, 1999, McIntosh was named Minister of Environment with responsibility for the Manitoba Public Insurance Corporation Act.

McIntosh was very narrowly defeated by New Democrat Jim Rondeau in the 1999 provincial election. McIntosh actually led Rondeau on election night, but fell three votes behind when the institutional and absentee ballots were counted.

McIntosh did not seek a return to office in 2003. McIntosh was associated with the Canadian Alliance prior to its merger with the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada in 2003. During the federal election of 2004 McIntosh campaigned for successful Conservative candidates Steven Fletcher and Joy Smith.