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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tThe exterior of the Manitoba Legislature is seen in Winnipeg, Wednesday, Nov. 6, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS\/John Woods<\/p>\n
Lagasse pointed to a few incidents, including an ethics commissioner\u2019s report last year that found three other Tories broke the conflict-of-interest law by pushing for approval of a silica sand mine near Lagasse\u2019s Dawson Trail constituency, east of Winnipeg.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Tories unsuccessfully pushed to get environmental approval for the project after losing the 2023 election and before the incoming NDP government could be sworn in, the ethics commissioner\u2019s report said. One of the three Tories, Jeff Wharton, continues to sit in caucus.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo still be sitting beside the member who directly was found in violation and not thrown out of the party \u2026 was extremely problematic for me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lagasse also cited an incident last year in which party leader Obby Khan mimicked shooting himself in the head while listening to a NDP cabinet minister in question period. Khan apologized for the gesture, but Lagasse, who has talked openly about having mental health struggles, said it was \u201cincredibly insensitive\u201d.<\/p>\n
Lagasse said there were other issues, but he didn\u2019t want to focus on Khan.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it\u2019s pretty evident by what\u2019s been going on, how things are within the party but \u2026 I\u2019m not going to give him the satisfaction of having a platform on this.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lagasse\u2019s move comes a few days after another Tory, Richard Perchotte in Selkirk, announced he will not seek re-election because he can do more as a private citizen than as a member of the Progressive Conservative Opposition. The Tories now have 20 of the 57 legislatures seats.<\/p>\n
Khan wished Lagasse well and told reporters he would not discuss any talk with Lagasse.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t feel it is right for me to share a private conversation with anyone, let alone the media, especially about caucus issues or conversations that we\u2019ve had,\u201d Khan said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBob served here, he did some good work here, and now I wish him nothing but the best.\u201d<\/p>\n
A political analyst said the change comes at a time when the Tories are trying to rebuild after losing the 2023 election. Since that vote, the Tories have lost a byelection in a traditional stronghold in the Tuxedo constituency in Winnipeg, are raising much less money that the governing New Democrats and are consistently polling behind the NDP.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are a lot of ominous signs that they\u2019re not in good shape to be ready for an election,\u201d Paul Thomas, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Manitoba said.<\/p>\n
Other Tories have announced they will not seek re-election, such as veteran politicians Kelvin Goertzen and Ron Schuler.<\/p>\n
While it\u2019s not unusual to see a Manitoba politician kicked out of caucus \u2014 the most recent case saw the NDP remove Mark Wasyliw, who sits as an Independent, in 2024 \u2014 having one leave voluntarily to sit as an Independent is rare.<\/p>\n
The New Democrats said Lagasse\u2019s departure shows the Tories are in trouble.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s something going on there, and that something, I would say \u2026 is a failure of leadership,\u201d deputy premier Uzoma Asagwara said.<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 10, 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WINNIPEG \u2013 Manitoba\u2019s Opposition Progressive Conservatives lost a seat in the legislature Tuesday as three-term member Bob Lagasse…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":527732,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194296],"tags":[49,48,22073],"class_list":["post-527731","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-winnipeg","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-winnipeg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527731","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=527731"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/527731\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/527732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=527731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=527731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=527731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}