Keewatinook is a provincial electoral division in the

Canadian province Within the geographical areas of Canada, the ten provinces and three territories are sub-national administrative divisions under the jurisdiction of the Canadian Constitution. In the 1867 Canadian Confederation, three provinces of British North ...

of Manitoba. The riding existed previously under the name Rupertsland. Starting with the 2011 election, the riding was renamed Kewatinook which means "from the north" in Cree. Effective with the

2019 Manitoba general election The 2019 Manitoba general election was held on September 10, 2019, to elect the 57 members to the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba. The incumbent Progressive Conservatives, led by Premier Brian Pallister, were re-elected to a second majority g ...

, the spelling was corrected to Keewatinook. It was created in 1915 from territories that were added to the province four years earlier and has existed continuously since that time. The area had been part of the

Grand Rapids Grand Rapids is a city and county seat of Kent County in the U.S. state of Michigan. At the 2020 census, the city had a population of 198,917 which ranks it as the second most-populated city in the state after Detroit. Grand Rapids is the ...

and

Churchill and Nelson Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from 1 ...

electoral districts for the

1914 Manitoba general election The 1914 Manitoba general election was held on July 10, 1914 to elect members of the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Manitoba, Canada. The result was a fifth consecutive majority government for the Conservative Party, led by premier Rodmo ...

. Originally named Rupertsland, its name was changed as part of the 2008 riding redistribution by the Manitoba Boundaries Commission. Kewatinook is currently the largest riding in the province, a sprawling northern constituency occupying a large portion of the eastern half of Manitoba. It was a smaller constituency until 1989 when it gained a significant amount of territory from the former riding of

Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from 1 ...

. The current Kewatinook riding stretches from the Ontario border in the southeast to the

Nunavut Nunavut ( , ; iu, ᓄᓇᕗᑦ , ; ) is the largest and northernmost Provinces and territories of Canada#Territories, territory of Canada. It was separated officially from the Northwest Territories on April 1, 1999, via the ''Nunavut Act'' ...

border in the north; it is also bordered by Lac Du Bonnet to the south and Flin Flon, The Pas and

Thompson Thompson may refer to: People * Thompson (surname) * Thompson M. Scoon (1888–1953), New York politician Places Australia *Thompson Beach, South Australia, a locality Bulgaria * Thompson, Bulgaria, a village in Sofia Province Canada * ...

to the west.

Churchill, Manitoba Churchill is a town in northern Manitoba, Canada, on the west shore of Hudson Bay, roughly from the Manitoba–Nunavut border. It is most famous for the many polar bears that move toward the shore from inland in the autumn, leading to the nickname ...

is the most significant community in this wide region. Elections in Kewatinook before 1966 were usually deferred until a later date than the rest of the province, due to the increased time it took to run elections in the region. Kewatinook's population in 2006 was 15,560. In 1999, the average family income was $33,787 (the fourth-lowest in Manitoba), and the unemployment rate was 25%. Over 34% of the riding's population have less than a Grade 9 education, the highest such rate in the province. Government services account for 21% of the riding's industry, followed by education services at 17%. Eighty-seven per cent of Kewatinook's residents are aboriginal, the highest percentage in the province. Over half the population list

Cree The Cree ( cr, néhinaw, script=Latn, , etc.; french: link=no, Cri) are a Indigenous peoples of the Americas, North American Indigenous people. They live primarily in Canada, where they form one of the country's largest First Nations in Canada ...

as their mother tongue. In 1999, there was only a 1% immigrant population. Prior to the 2016 election, the

New Democratic Party The New Democratic Party (NDP; french: Nouveau Parti démocratique, NPD) is a federal political party in Canada. Widely described as social democratic,The party is widely described as social democratic: * * * * * * * * * * * * t ...

represented the riding from 1969 to 2016, when

Judy Klassen Judy Klassen is a Canadian provincial politician, who was interim leader of the Manitoba Liberal Party, from October 2016 to June 2017, succeeding Rana Bokhari. Klassen was first elected as the Member of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba for ...

of the Liberal Party defeated longtime MLA Eric Robinson. The current MLA is

Ian Bushie Ian Bushie is a Canadians, Canadian politician, who was elected to the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba in the 2019 Manitoba general election.Bryce Hoye"Meet the rookies: Manitobans elect 13 first-time MLAs" CBC News Manitoba, September 11, 2019 ...

of the New Democratic Party. Bushie defeated Jason Harper of the Liberal Party to take the seat in 2019.

List of provincial representatives

Electoral results

1916 by-election

1920 general election

1922 general election

1927 general election

1932 general election

1936 general election

1941 general election

1945 general election

1949 general election

1953 general election

1958 general election

1959 general election

1962 general election

1966 general election

1969 general election

1973 general election

1977 general election

1981 general election

1986 general election

1988 general election

1990 general election

1993 by-election

1995 general election

1999 general election

2003 general election

2007 general election

2011 general election

2016 general election

2019 general election

Previous boundaries

References

{{coord, 55.453, -93.779, type:adm3rd_region:CA-MB, display=title Manitoba provincial electoral districts Churchill, Manitoba