Linda Asper (born 1 December 1943) is a politician in

Manitoba Manitoba is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population ...

, Canada. She joined the Liberal Party and then later returned to the New Democratic Party during the 1990s. She was a member of the

Manitoba legislature The Manitoba Legislature is the legislature of the province of Manitoba, Canada. Today, the legislature is made of two elements: the lieutenant governor of Manitoba, lieutenant governor (representing the King of Canada) and the unicameral assemb ...

from 1999 to 2003.

Early life

Asper holds a Ph.D. in education, and had an extensive career as an educator before entering political life. She was a

Winnipeg Winnipeg () is the capital and largest city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Manitoba. It is centred on the confluence of the Red River of the North, Red and Assiniboine River, Assiniboine rivers. , Winnipeg h ...

school trustee for the

Seine River The Seine ( , ) is a river in northern France. Its drainage basin is in the Paris Basin (a geological relative lowland) covering most of northern France. It rises at Source-Seine, northwest of Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres p ...

division, and served as president of the Manitoba Teachers' Society and vice-president of the

Canadian Teachers' Federation The Canadian Teachers' Federation (CTF; ) is a bilingual not-for-profit organization and a national alliance of provincial and territorial teacher organizations representing more than 365,000 elementary and secondary school teachers throughout C ...

for a period of time. Asper was also a member of the Faculty Council of the

University of Manitoba The University of Manitoba (U of M, UManitoba, or UM) is a public research university in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Founded in 1877, it is the first university of Western Canada. Both by total student enrolment and campus area, the University of ...

, and served on the board of governors at St. Boniface College. In addition to her career in education, she was a member of the Manitoba Action Committee on the Status of Women.

Political career

In the 1990 provincial election, Asper ran as a Liberal in the south

riding of Niakwa. She was defeated by Progressive Conservative candidate Jack Reimer by 4,950 votes to 4,301. By 1999, Asper had crossed over to the New Democratic Party. In that year's provincial election, she was elected as a New Democratic for the Winnipeg riding of Riel, defeating Progressive Conservative incumbent David Newman 4,833 votes to 4,559.

Post-political career

In April 2003, Asper announced that she was leaving politics to take a position with

Education International Education International (EI) is a global union federation (GUF) of teachers' trade unions consisting of 383 member organizations in 178 countries and territories that represents over 32 million education teachers and education support personnel fr ...

an advocacy group based in

Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...

Belgium Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeas ...

. She now promotes the rights of both children and educators on an international level, and has been a vocal opponent of

child labour Child labour is the exploitation of children through any form of work that interferes with their ability to attend regular school, or is mentally, physically, socially and morally harmful. Such exploitation is prohibited by legislation w ...

practices.

Personal life

Linda Asper was the sister-in-law of the late

Israel Asper Israel Harold "Izzy" Asper (August 11, 1932 – October 7, 2003) was a Canadian tax lawyer and media magnate. He was the founder and owner of the now-defunct TV and media company CanWest Global Communications Corp and father to its former CE ...

Electoral record

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Asper, Linda New Democratic Party of Manitoba MLAs Politicians from Winnipeg Women MLAs in Manitoba Living people 20th-century Canadian women politicians 21st-century Canadian women politicians 1943 births 20th-century members of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba 21st-century members of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba