Intentionally or not, 'coulda, woulda, shoulda' is now a PC pandemic slogan

Three times over the past 10 months, high-profile Manitoba Progressive Conservatives have used some variation of "coulda, shoulda, woulda" in response to questions about the way the government handled the pandemic.

Premier Heather Stefanson says this is not a formal party talking point. The provincial opposition may have other designs on it.

"Coulda, shoulda, woulda" has tremendous potential for use in attack ads when the next general election nears in 2023.

Former premier Brian Pallister was the first PC leader to employ this rhetoric. When the third wave of the pandemic was spiralling out of control, Pallister used the line to push back against suggestions Manitoba dawdled before enacting new restrictions.

"Nobody has been able in this country and most places in the world to keep the third wave out," Pallister told reporters during a telephone news briefing on May 7, 2021. 

"So I say to the Monday-morning quarterback people, sure, we should have, could have, might have. That's fine. Nobody else did that. Nobody else has been able to do it."

Manitoba, however, fared so poorly during the third wave, the sheer volume of severe COVID-19 cases overwhelmed intensive care wards in this province. In May and June, a total of 57 patients were transferred to intensive care wards in other provinces.

Stefanson was the health minister at the time. Late in the summer, when she ran for leader of the Progressive Conservative Party, she too was asked why she didn't push for tougher restrictions in April, before COVID transmission spiralled out of control.

"Coulda, shoulda, woulda," Stefanson said in an interview on Sept. 1, 2021. "These are what we can think of after the fact, but when you're thrown in the middle of this, there is no playbook for this."

Last week, the PC candidate for the byelection in Fort Whyte — the provincial constituency vacated by Pallister when he resigned — employed a very similar line.

"Should have, could have, would have," Obby Khan said in an interview on March 8. "The government did the best it can. There is no playbook written on this."

On Monday, Stefanson was asked whether "shoulda, coulda, woulda" is an official party slogan.

"No," she said at Richardson International Airport, expressing amusement at the premise of the question.

This may not be something the premier wishes to laugh off.