On May 1, 2003, Duguid was appointed by Liberal leader Dalton McGuinty as the party's candidate for Scarborough Centre in the upcoming provincial election. This upset many in the local party association, as 1999 Ontario general election candidate Costas Manios was widely expected to win the nomination again. Manios decided to run against Duguid as an Independent (essentially campaigning as an "Independent Liberal"), and many believed he would deny Duguid victory by splitting the Liberal vote. Instead, the provincial trend overrode local factors—Duguid defeated incumbent Progressive Conservative Marilyn Mushinski by over 10,000 votes, while Manios finished fourth, behind Michael Laxer of the Ontario New Democratic Party.