On a mission to fix health care, Jane Philpott is open to a return to politics

More than five years after she was expelled from caucus in the fallout from the SNC-Lavalin affair, former Liberal health minister Jane Philpott is leaving the door open to a possible return to politics.

Philpott was asked about her future in an interview airing Saturday on CBC’s The House.

“If a door ever opened that was the right one, that would allow me to go back into a political role, I would certainly consider it,” she told host Catherine Cullen.

In the interview — in which she discussed her new book, Health For All — Philpott said she will not seek another term as dean of health sciences at Queen’s University when her current term expires next June. She also said she wants to remain involved in health policy.

LISTEN | Jane Philpott’s prescription for fixing primary care:

Family doctor and former Liberal health minister Jane Philpott sits down with Catherine Cullen for the final instalment of our Book Smart Summer series, discussing her prescription for a better primary health care system in her book, Health For All.

“It’s possible that might involve a role in government some day, but I’m still exploring what that might look like,” she said.

Philpott was elected MP for Markham-Stouffville in 2015 and was appointed health minister. She moved to the Indigenous services portfolio in a cabinet shuffle in 2017.

She later criticized the government’s handling of the SNC-Lavalin affair and resigned her cabinet post in March 2019. A month later, she was expelled from the Liberal caucus, along with fellow minister Jody Wilson-Raybould.

Philpott was a close ally of Jody Wilson-Raybould, the former justice minister and attorney general at the centre of the SNC-Lavalin scandal. Testifying before a Commons committee in 2019, Wilson-Raybould said that 11 officials in the Prime Minister’s Office and other government offices inappropriately pressured her to override a decision to prosecute SNC-Lavalin on bribery charges related to contracts in Libya.

Philpott ran as an independent candidate in the 2019 federal election but lost to new Liberal candidate Helena Jaczek.

Philpott toldThe Housethat politics is a profession that depends on a number of circumstances, including timing, but she didn’t want to rule out a return.

Philpott is also set to address the provincial Ontario Liberal caucus at its conference in London, Ont., in September.

Health For All focuses on Canada’s primary care system and addresses the role politics plays in changing health policy. Asked about her own time as federal health minister, she pointed to accomplishments on drug policy and medical assistance in dying.

“If I were there again, I wish I could have moved on and continued work on access to primary care, which is my greatest passion,” she said.

“You can’t ever act fast enough to solve all of the problems … And I was not able to accomplish all the things that I would have liked to.”