GC EYE Summit Presenter - Gord Mackintosh
Gord Mackintosh
Minister of Family Services and Housing,
Minister responsible for Persons with Disabilities
Biography
Gord Mackintosh was first elected as New Democratic Party MLA for the north Winnipeg constituency of St. Johns in 1993 and re-elected in four general elections. He served as the Government House Leader, Minister of Justice and Attorney General with responsibility for the Manitoba Public Insurance Corporation from 1999 to 2006 when Premier Gary Doer appointed him Minister of Family Services and Housing and Minister responsible for Persons with Disabilities.
Gord has worked for the Canadian and Manitoba Human Rights Commissions and was later Deputy Clerk of Manitoba's legislature. As a lawyer with the Winnipeg law firm Thompson Dorfman Sweatman, he was involved in environmental issues and notably was advisor to Elijah Harper during the Meech Lake constitutional crisis.
He was a long-time chair of the Patients Rights Committee and served on the boards of the Rainbow Society for children with life threatening illnesses and the Manitoba Association for Rights and Liberties. He helped lead the successful fight against closing the St. Johns Library in 1993. As MLA, he helped establish the St. Johns Youth Justice Council, several residents associations, and citizen patrols. Gord also co-chaired three successive New Democratic Party election platform committees.
Gord's focus on children has helped produce a child-victim friendly courtroom and waiting rooms, Cybertip.ca to report on-line predators and child pornography, Amber Alert, a high risk offender website, and strict new child support laws. He has helped lead successful national and provincial efforts to strengthen child protection laws.
Gord helped co-author the province's AllAboard poverty reduction strategy and launched the historic 'Family Choices' 5 year expansion of child care and an overhaul of child welfare called "Changes for Children". Tracia's Trust was unveiled to counter sexual exploitation including Canada's first law to require the reporting of child pornography.
An initiative to get Manitobans off welfare called "Rewarding Work" and supports for persons with disabilities known as marketAbilities was followed by the proposed multi-year "Opening Doors" disabilities strategy. The province's low income HOMEWorks! housing strategy includes a new mental health housing and homeless initiative and a renewal of Manitoba Housing.
In addition to establishing the Helen Betty Osborne Memorial Foundation, Gord has launched safety initiatives unique to Manitoba, including Lighthouses for after school youth activities, Project Gang Proof and Turnabout which provides interventions for offenders under age 12. The Safer Communities and Neighbourhoods Act, a Canadian first, has shut down hundreds of drug and prostitution houses.
Safety Aid was set up to provide home safety improvements for low income and victimized seniors. Gord was also instrumental in developing Manitoba's meth strategy.
Gord has introduced strong new human rights and domestic violence laws, strengthened procedures to prevent wrongful convictions and furthered work in Aboriginal justice. A successful auto theft strategy was launched in 2005 to theft-proof 90 per cent of Winnipeg vehicles in 5 years and to intensively target auto thieves. In 2000 he established a gang prosecution and probation unit, followed by innovative civil laws to counter organized crime and unprecedented new funding for policing and integrated police units, including a new police in schools initiative and coordinated Citizens on Patrol. Under his direction, implementation of Manitoba's Victims' Bill of Rights set a new standard for the treatment of crime victims.
In 2006, the UN recognized efforts with the Chief Judge to reduce court backlogs and the American Prosecutors' Research Institute recognized Gord's establishment of Canada's first community prosecutor. His efforts have been held out by MADD Canada as a model in the fight against impaired driving.
He has degrees in political studies and law and lives in Winnipeg's north end with his wife Margaret and three children.