by Fred Morris
3 December 2024
In June 1966, my Mother Lara and I attended a Liberal political meeting at Britannia School featuring Liberal candidate Lloyd Axworthy, his brother Tom Axworthy, and Liberal Leader Gil Molgat. This campaign was the first of the ten elections that Lloyd ran in as a candidate.
Lloyd Axworthy was born on 21 December 1939 in North Battleford, Saskatchewan. He grew up in the West and North Ends of Winnipeg. In 1958, he developed a passion for politics after hearing Liberal Leader Lester Pearson speak at the Winnipeg Auditorium. Lloyd was encouraged to attend this meeting by J. J. Phillips, one of his Sisler High School teachers. Lloyd was a participant in various Tuxis Boys Parliaments. After attending United College (now the University of Winnipeg), he spent four years in the USA as a student at Princeton and then a lecturer at Middlebury College.
After his 1965 return to Winnipeg, Lloyd Axworthy became a United College lecturer. When he received the Liberal nomination for St. James, he was living in the West Broadway area. The St. James riding went from St. James Street to Conway Street and included part of the Base.
The rural-based Provincial Liberals were the second-place party heading into the 1966 Provincial Election. Lloyd and seven other Greater Winnipeg Liberal candidates — James Smith, Ross White, Don Cook, Scott Wright, Howard Loewen, Mel Fenson, and Frank Muldoon — campaigned on Winnipeg issues. The group was referred to as the Ginger Group. The Group's policies included increasing the minimum wage from 80 cents to $1.25, creation of a full time Labour Board, a Consumer Commission, and provincial programmes to assist kindergartens.
The 1966 PC and NDP St. James candidates both resided on Guildford Street. Doug Stanes had served on the St. James Council and was seeking his fourth consecutive term as PC MLA. Doug was a great constituency politician who always seemed to be at the community meeting places. On Sunday mornings, Doug and his wife Bernice walked to the worship service at Deer Lodge United Church. During his third term, the expanded St. James Bridge and the St. James Civic Center opened. Doug may have seemed vulnerable because of the PC Government's tendency to ignore MLAs who represented constituencies north of the Assiniboine River when creating their cabinets. The NDP candidate was Jim Rose, a mechanic at Trans-Canada Air Lines.
The Ginger group were all defeated. Axworthy lost to Stanes by 790 votes. No other Conservative candidate ever defeated Lloyd Axworthy. The PCs retained power with a reduced majority. The Liberals remained the rural-based Official Opposition. In the following 1969 Election, the Liberals lost their rural strength and became a perennial struggling third-place party except for the brief 1988 revival.
In the 1968 Federal Election, Lloyd was defeated by Stanley Knowles in Winnipeg North Center. Between 1973 and 1997, Lloyd won eight consecutive elections in the provincial riding of Fort Rouge, and the federal ridings of Winnipeg Fort Garry, and Winnipeg South Centre. Lloyd served in the Cabinets of Pierre Trudeau, John Turner, and Jean Chretien. He held the Transportation, Labour, Employment & Immigration, and Foreign Affairs portfolios. As the Foreign Affairs Minister, Lloyd became the leader in a treaty to ban anti-personal landmines. On 5 December 1997, Lloyd on behalf of Canada signed the Landmine Treaty. A total of 122 Countries signed the treaty.
After 34 years of pursuing political office, Lloyd retired from politics in 2000. Let us remember that his first campaign was in St. James.
Page revised: 27 June 2026
