Chris Stockwell

Chris Stockwell
36th Speaker of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario
In office October 3, 1996 – October 19, 1999
Premier	Mike Harris
Lieutenant Governor	Hal Jackman Hilary Weston
Preceded by	Al McLean
Succeeded by	Gary Carr
Member of Provincial Parliament for Ontario
In office 1999–2003
Preceded by	New riding
Succeeded by	Donna Cansfield
Constituency	Etobicoke Centre
In office 1990–1999
Preceded by	Linda LeBourdais
Succeeded by	Riding abolished
Constituency	Etobicoke West
Personal details
Born	(1957-03-09)March 9, 1957 London, Ontario, Canada
Died	February 10, 2018(2018-02-10) (aged 60) Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Political party	Progressive Conservative
Children	Kale Stockwell, 1987 Victoria Stockwell, 1989
Parent(s)	Bill Stockwell, 1934 Loretta Stockwell, 1935
Occupation	Political consultant

Chris Stockwell (March 9, 1957 – February 10, 2018) was a Canadian politician from Ontario. He was a Progressive Conservative member of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 1990 to 2003, and served as Speaker of the legislature and cabinet minister in the governments of Mike Harris and Ernie Eves. Before entering provincial politics, he had been a member of Etobicoke City Council and the Metro Toronto Council. Stockwell's father, Bill Stockwell, was also a prominent municipal politician.

Politics

Municipal

Stockwell was elected as a city of Etobicoke Controller in 1982, was defeated in his attempt at re-election in 1985, but was elected to the Metropolitan Toronto council in November 1988 representing Lakeshore-Queensway, in the Etobicoke region, and also served as chair of the Metro O'Keefe Centre for the Performing Arts during this period.

Provincial

Stockwell was elected to the Ontario provincial legislature in the 1990 provincial election, defeating incumbent Liberal Linda LeBourdais by about 4,000 votes in Etobicoke West. The New Democratic Party won the election, and Stockwell sat on the opposition benches for the next five years.

The Tories won a majority in the provincial election of 1995, and Stockwell was easily elected in his own riding. Despite his experience, he was not appointed to cabinet by the new Premier, Mike Harris. He soon developed a reputation as one of the more prominent Red Tories in the Tory caucus.

Stockwell was elected Speaker of the Assembly on October 3, 1996. He was not Harris's preferred choice for the position, but won with support from members in all three parties. Stockwell won a reputation for independence in the Speaker's chair, and was not afraid to criticize members of his own party.

Stockwell played a key role in the anti-megacity filibuster of 1997, where the Opposition parties proposed thousands of amendments identical except for a few words. He ruled against the government when they moved that the legislature did not need to vote on each amendment, but in their favor when they suggested that the identical text did not need to be read aloud each time.

In the provincial election of 1999, Stockwell's personal popularity was such that he was able to win an easy re-election in the redistributed riding of Etobicoke Centre after defeating fellow MPP Doug Ford, Sr. for then Progressive Conservative nomination. On June 17, 1999, he was appointed to cabinet as Minister of Labour.

Despite Stockwell's reputation as a Red Tory, he implemented a number of right-wing policy directives as Labour Minister. He was largely credited with shepherding through the legislature a bill to increase the maximum work-week to 60 hours, and also promoted the Harris government's "Workplace Democracy Act", which made union organization more difficult. In addition to the Labour portfolio, Stockwell also served as Commissioner of the Board of Internal Economy for a few months in 2001.

Stockwell was a candidate to succeed Mike Harris in the 2002 PC leadership campaign. During this campaign, he claimed that the right-wing initiatives of Harris's "Common Sense Revolution" were necessary in 1995, but no longer made sense in 2003. He won little support from party insiders, and placed last with four per cent of the vote. He supported Ernie Eves, the winning candidate, on the second ballot.

On April 15, 2002, Eves appointed Stockwell as Government House Leader and Minister of Environment and Energy. The Energy and Environment portfolios were broken up on August 22, 2002, with Stockwell keeping Environment.

On June 17, 2003, he resigned from cabinet in the wake of a controversy concerning the misuse of expenses. All expenses were referred to the provincial Integrity Commissioner who at that time was the Honourable Coulter A. Osbourne, a former Ontario Supreme Court judge. He undertook an exhaustive review. In his first report dated January 31, 2003, covering the period from June 26, 1995, to December 31, 2002, the Honourable Coulter A. Osbourne concluded: "I am satisfied that the expenses which I have reviewed, net of reimbursements made, are allowable expenses (see section 15 of the Act)." On June 9, 2003, he stated: "I am pleased to report that all expense claims made for the period January 1st to March 31st met with the requirements of the Act and the Rules Governing the Expenses of Cabinet Ministers, Opposition Leaders and other persons." On June 3, 2004, covering the period April 3, 2003 to March 31, 2004, the Commissioner again stated: "I am pleased to report that all requests for reimbursements were complied with and all expense claims reviewed were subsequently approved."

On July 25, 2003, Stockwell announced that he would not run in the 2003 election. He was later employed as a political consultant.

Attempted return to Toronto City Council

In 2013, Stockwell was one of several candidates for appointment to Toronto City Council to replace Doug Holyday in Ward 3. The Etobicoke Community Council recommended him to the city council as its preferred candidate for the appointment; however, October 10, 2013, the final city council vote selected Peter Leon. In September 2014, Stockwell registered as a candidate for Toronto City Council in Ward 4 in Etobicoke. He came in fourth place, with 9.24% of the vote, losing to John Campbell.

Death

Stockwell died in Toronto of cancer at the age of 60.

Electoral record (partial)

Ward 4 - Etobicoke Centre (October 27, 2014)

Ward 4
Candidate	Votes	%
John Campbell	8,227	34.44
Niels Christensen	6,847	28.66
Angelo Carnevale	4,968	20.79
Chris Stockwell	2,208	9.24
Adam Slobodian	384	1.60
Tony Chun	286	1.19
William Murdoch	278	1.16
Rosemarie Mulhall	267	1.11
Mario Magno	216	0.90
Oscar Vidal-Calvet	205	0.85
Total	23,886	100

1999 Ontario general election: Etobicoke Centre
Party	Candidate	Votes	%	±%	Expenditures
	Progressive Conservative	Chris Stockwell	25,518	54.12		$49,034
	Liberal	Agnes Ugolini Potts	19,035	40.37	–	$41,081
	New Democratic	Bonte Minnema	1,309	2.78		$1,896
	Family Coalition	Dan McCash	389	0.83	–	$31
	Green	Christopher J. Morton	375	0.80	–	none listed
	Natural Law	Geraldine Jackson	316	0.67		$0
	Marxist–Leninist	Elaine Couto	209	0.44		$26
Total valid votes			47,151	100.00
Rejected, unmarked and declined ballots			414
Turnout			47,565	64.55
Electors on the lists			73,691

1995 Ontario general election: Etobicoke West

	Party	Candidate	Votes	Vote %
	Progressive Conservative	Chris Stockwell	18,349	55.3
	Liberal	Michael Brown	9,826	29.6
	New Democrat	Judy Jones	4,608	13.9
	Natural Law	Laureen G. Amos	399	1.2
		Total	33,182

1990 Ontario general election: Etobicoke West
Party	Candidate	Votes	%
	Progressive Conservative	Chris Stockwell	13,711	40.8
	Liberal	Linda LeBourdais	10,082	30.0
	New Democratic	Judy Jones	7,988	23.8
	Family Coalition	Kevin McGourty	1,045	3.1
	Libertarian	Janice Hazlett	495	1.5
	Independent	Martin Fraser	303	0.9
Total			33,624
Source: "How Metro-Area Voted". The Toronto Daily Star. Toronto. 7 September 1990. p. A10.

Metropolitan Toronto Council, 1988

Lakeshore Queensway

Chris Stockwell - 10,442

Morley Kells - 7,790

Toronto municipal election, 1985

Etobicoke Board of Control, 1985 (4 elected)
Candidate	Votes
Dick O'Brien (incumbent)	34,248
Lois Griffin	33,175
Leonard Braithwaite (incumbent)	33,085
Morley Kells	29,817
Chris Stockwell (incumbent)	29,629
Doug Holyday	28,982
James Shawera	5,473

External links

• Chris Stockwell – Ontario Legislative Assembly parliamentary history (archive)