She worked as a teacher for twenty-three years before entering political life, and in 1986 received the Hedley Award for Excellence in Research[citation needed].

In one of the closest constituency races of the campaign, Smith narrowly defeated New Democrat Lawrie Cherniack by thirty votes.

In 2002, as justice critic for the Manitoba Progressive Conservatives, she spoke against a bill which provided adoption rights to same-sex couples in that province.

[1] Fort Garry was a top NDP target in the 2003 election, and Smith lost the constituency to New Democrat Kerri Irvin-Ross by eighty-seven votes.

In 2004, Smith was selected to be part of the Canadian delegation assigned to travel to Ukraine and observe a court-ordered repeat of the second round of voting the presidential election.

She had previously been nominated as a candidate of the Canadian Alliance, where she was the Manitoba organizer for Stockwell Day's bid for leadership, before that party merged with the Progressive Conservatives in 2003–04.

Smith defeated Duguid again by a significantly larger plurality in the 2006 federal election, as the Conservatives won a national minority government, replacing the Liberals as such.

In 2006, Smith introduced a private member's bill, asking parliamentarians to condemn human trafficking and come up with a comprehensive plan to combat the problem.

"[10] In October 2010, Smith conducted the inaugural Honouring Heroes Award Ceremony at Eastview Community Church, an annual event recognizing people who have fought to support victims of sexual trafficking.

[13] Smith proposed and claimed to be working on, in July 2013, a bill that disallows access to pornography online for all Canadians by default unless they choose to opt in, similar to earlier legislation put forward in the U.K. by British Prime Minister David Cameron.