Chapter 1: January - June 1990
As 1990 emerged, squinting in the pale winter's light, all was quiet on the Western front.
It was a classic January in Saskatchewan.
As the province slowly clambered back to life, headed back to school or the office after the Christmas holidays, its residents were sluggish from overeating, frozen temperatures and the grim realization that winter was not yet half over.
For workers earning a living building southern Saskatchewan’s Rafferty-Alameda Dam, the New Year and the new decade opened on a disconcerting note. In late December a Canadian court judge demanded an environmental assessment on the project, a requirement of federal law willfully bypassed by both Devine and Mulroney governments. The judgment meant dam-related jobs and livelihoods were at risk of being shutdown, for a second time.
In his book Dams of Contention, Bill Redekop describes the Rafferty-Alameda Dam project as “a snapshot of the birth of environmental law in a society that wasn’t entirely ready for it. American environmental law was a generation ahead of Canada’s at the time. That’s why North Dakota looked to Saskatchewan to get the dams built.”
The Legislative Assembly wouldn’t reconvene for another three months. Premier Grant Devine was out of the country, schmoozing the collapsing Soviet Union for business opportunities. He and his family would return home on the same day an attack by Azerbaijani militants resulted in fierce ethnic fighting and blood running in Moscow streets.
Back in the province, Devine quickly learned the situation wasn’t ideal either.
A new decade meant new spin.
Speaking to reporters after his Eastern European jaunt, Devine foreshadowed a deficit budget - his eighth in a row. He also insisted he would only raise taxes on sinful things like cigarettes and alcohol, providing cold comfort for an anxiety-ridden, destitute population, reliant on its few vices.
Meanwhile, the Conference Board of Canada breathlessly announced that the Saskatchewan economy would lead Canada’s in 1990… if the weather and grain prices held.
A big If.
Because everything old is new again,
in January of 1990 this message was sent by SaskPower to the federal government:
Yes almost 35 years ago the Devine government, ran by the same people who run the Sask Party’s, moaned to Brian Mulroney’s federal government that SaskPower would be destroyed by any national action to mitigate climate change, especially reducing coal-fired electricity.
Today, the province of Alberta has weaned itself off coal entirely, thanks to a plan that was designed and implemented by its government in under ten years.
Rumors of labour discontent in Saskatchewan’s public education system became reality in early 1990, when Regina teachers threatened a half-day walkout to protest lack of progress on their contract. Intermittent job action continued in both Regina and Saskatoon throughout the remainder of the school year.
In February, Nelson Mandela’s imprisonment ended and hope raged eternal that he could further close South Africa’s brutal racial divide and end its white minority government.
Meanwhile, the City of Saskatoon had still not sworn in its first female police officer.
In March of 1990 the RCMP ruled that orthodox Sikh members could wear a turban with their uniform. The decision followed months of lobbying against it by Western Canadian special interest groups, including a petition that was backed by some Conservative MPs.
It would be a historical moment in Saskatchewan as well.
SARM, which was in the midst of its annual convention when news of the RCMP’s decision broke, put forward a resolution on the matter. SARM delegates voted 1000-1 in favour of RCMP officers only wearing stetsons.
The lone voice of dissent was an Aberdeen-area farmer named Ron Peters.
“Equality is not sameness. The RCMP have respect worldwide for the quality of their work, not for their uniform.”
Peters, in an impassioned speech from the podium before SARM members cast their ballot, implored his peers to consider the implications of their vote. He was the only person in the room who came down on the right side of history, leaving 1000 members of virtually every rural municipality in Saskatchewan represented by these words:
“If they want to wear turbans, they should go back to their own country…If they live here they should do as Canadians do.” - Gord Chaban, SARM delegate for Saskatoon, to reporters in March 1990.
Maybe Carl from Odessa (pop. 201) did a better job summarizing the sentiment:
“It’s played an important part in our history. My niece and nephew are in the RCMP and it’s a tough life. Respect that.” - Carl Hoffman, Saskatoon Star Phoenix, March 16, 1990.
What do Carl’s niece and nephew have to do with whether Sikh RCMP members should be allowed to wear turbans? Only Carl knows, who hopefully was not an accurate representation of the overall level of intelligence held by attendees of the SARM Convention of 1990.
Imagine being the single voice of dissent in a room of one thousand other people, finding yourself unable to bring even one around to your perspective. Peters was well-known in his community for being an outstanding person of good character, but according to his family, it still hit him hard.
Tthe vote was one thousand to one that day… and the one was right. A powerful reminder of what change in Saskatchewan has always looked and felt like: insurmountable.
Delegates who attended that convention were not only from across the province, but from across all political stripes. In the Nineties, racism and bigotry were not divided by party lines.
It seems prudent that SARM might consider posthumously recognizing the extraordinary example of Ron Peters.
PC Party caucus communications director John Scraba used the regimented media schedule he’d created for Budget Day, March 29, 1990, as cover to slip out of the Saskatchewan Legislature unnoticed.
That morning journalists and the NDP Opposition caucus were tucked away in their offices in “lockup”, a process that involved pouring through embargoed, confidential, advanced copies of the 1990 Saskatchewan budget.
It is still standard practise today. The extra lead time ensures journalists have their stories and responses ready in time for dinnertime news casts and print news deadlines. It also gives the Opposition a reasonable window of time to be able to prepare a timely response.
Lockup is one of the few, if not unfortunately-named, professional courtesies still enjoyed today between the Government of Saskatchewan, its Official Opposition and local media.
So knowing that the chance of being spotted was less than normal, Scraba schlepped through downtown Regina’s snow and dirt encrusted streets, a briefcase full of stolen public money clutched in his gloved hand. He was headed for the Cornwall Centre’s branch of the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC).
After stomping the snow off his boots, Scraba told the bank teller he wanted to open a safety deposit box. He used the name “Fred Peters”. Peters was Scraba’s colleague in the Legislature, an assistant to Finance Minister Lorne Hepworth. The address Scraba provided to rent the box was Room 201 in the Saskatchewan Legislature, the PC Party caucus office, where (the real) Peters and Hepburn had been preparing for Budget Day events since the wee morning hours.
There was so much stolen cash lying around his office that Scraba went back to the Cornwall Centre, on that same morning, to stuff a second briefcase-full into the safety deposit box. Scraba would later testify he felt relieved that a dirty job was done.
The pilfered public money was out of his desk and safely tucked away.
Visibly relaxed, Scraba grabbed his tape recorder and walked back out into the cavernous hallways of the Saskatchewan Legislature. Moments later, he would face a wall of reporters, ready to spin the province’s finances.
That afternoon the PC Party’s 1990-91 budget delivery was lacklustre, dragged down even further by a projected $363-million deficit. Dubious government accounting rules of the day masked a much more troubling financial picture for the province, but it would be a while yet before that information would fully come to light.
In 1990, Saskatchewan farmers had high hopes that Devine would come through with spring seeding subsidies. Instead, the provincial budget included a new loan program, repayable at 10.75% interest. That rate was still better than what was available through traditional lenders, given the Bank of Canada’s (BoC) prime rate was over 14% at the time.
A week after releasing that unpopular budget in 1990, Devine turned on his ally, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. In a scrum with reporters in Regina, the premier spat angry separatist tropes and blamed the federal government for everything that had ever outraged Saskatchewan farmers.
“There’s a lot of discussion these days about a distinct society. You’re looking at an extinct society in Western Canada.” - Premier Grant Devine, May 3, 1990 Regina Leader Post
A few days later, Devine had a meltdown in a room full of agriculture stakeholders who had rejected his 10.75% loan proposition. It had been a relatively cordial meeting, until Devine learned the next one would be held in a union hall. Despite the organizers’ insistence that using that hall was a matter of convenience, Devine was outraged, convinced it was part of a broader plot against him.
Hollering “You’ve played your hand!” and “If you’re serious you won’t play politics!” at shocked attendees, Devine stormed out of the meeting.
On Budget Day, John Scraba spun the cost of the 10.75% loan program as $40-million. He was lying. Had the BoC prime rate held, that price would have been exponentially higher. Instead, the rate peaked in spring 1990 at 14.75% and began to drop.
The taxpayer didn’t lose its shirt after all.
It was a rare occurrence.
Lorne McLaren should have been a big deal.
A popular local businessman from Yorkton, McLaren swept his riding for the PC Party in 1982. Prior to that Yorkton, affectionately tucked away behind Saskatchewan’s “Garlic Curtain”, had been staunch NDP territory.
After McLaren nailed that win for Devine, his reward was a position in the premier’s first cabinet, as well as responsibility for two of the Crown jewels of the province’s publicly-owned portfolio: Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan (PCS) and SaskPower. The added duties meant more power, responsibility and a significant pay hike over his $53,000 MLA salary.
Yet as the first half of 1990 drew to a close, Saskatchewan print journalist Dale Eisler wondered why McLaren had been demoted to Grant Devine’s back bench, then more or less disappeared from public view.
In a June 28, 1990 column that ran in the Saskatoon Star Phoenix and Regina Leader Post, Eisler outlined McLaren’s personal financial woes, then linked them to the mild assertion that McLaren had been demoted due to a conflict of interest that wasn’t being shared with the public.
After painting that picture for his audience, Eisler reiterated that his theory was conjecture… probably.
Plausible deniability was one of Grant Devine’s saving graces, but Eisler’s theory wasn’t wrong. In fact, the truth of the matter wasn’t just “compromising”, it was criminal.
The real reason McLaren had lowered his public profile and opted to lurk behind the scenes would have blown Dale Eisler’s mind. A few years later, it would land McLaren in jail.
Spring in Saskatchewan came and went in the blink of an eye, completing the transformation from frozen hinterland to summer prairie virtually overnight.
A classic tradition.
News on the Meech Lake Accord - a series of proposed amendments to the Canadian Constitution, which the province of Quebec had refused to sign in 1982 - was everywhere.
The Meech Lake Accord was all about amending the constitution to recognize Quebec as a "distinct society" within Canada. It also weakened federalism, granted provinces greater powers over immigration and offered a constitutional veto to provinces over future amendments.
The accord required ratification by all ten provinces within three years of its inception. This created a June 23, 1990 deadline, which coincided with the federal Liberal party’s leadership convention.
A bitter rivalry between candidates Paul Martin and Jean Chrétien had divided its membership, largely down pro and anti-accord lines. Martin was onside with Meech Lake unequivocally. Jean Chrétien’s support was tepid at best, earning him the ire of his home province of Quebec.
On a warm Calgary weekend, the first of summer 1990, Martin was knocked out in the first round after Chrétien secured over 50 percent of the vote. At that, the Liberal Party convention, held under the distinctive roof of Calgary’s Olympic Saddledome, exploded into both cheers and jeers.
Saskatchewan’s Liberal Party leader Lynda Haverstock was appalled when a cluster of young Quebecois members loudly booed Chrétien’s acceptance speech. Confidently and assertively Haverstock, who had not pledged allegiance to either federal leadership candidate, marched over and asked the disgruntled French youth to instead project unity for the sake of the greater good.
Speaking to reporters after his win, Chrétien referred to Haverstock as a “very attractive lady” and promised to support her efforts to elect more Liberals to Saskatchewan’s Legislature.
Thousands of miles to the east, a pale, shook Brian Mulroney tried to put a positive spin on a massive personal and political failure.
It had been so close. Just a few weeks earlier, all ten Canadian premiers had promised to sign off on the accord before its deadline. Then Manitoba and Newfoundland backed out at the eleventh hour, leaving the deal to die on the table as its midnight deadline came and went.
After the deal collapsed, Quebecers burned Canadian flags, booed the anthem and swore to exit Canada. From there the hurricane force of separatist sentiment in Quebec only kept gaining momentum.
In 1990 Grant Devine was the only premier in Canada who didn’t make a statement on the day the Meech Lake Accord died. Perhaps with the weight of his disastrous latest provincial budget on his mind, Devine said he wanted to talk to Mulroney first.
Briefly, let’s now rewind this tape even further, back to a crisp early October morning in 1986.
At 7:30AM Eastern the sun was rising over Ottawa’s Parliament Hill, already up for hours, thrumming with the business of running the country.
It was still dark at 5:30AM in Saskatchewan, where a panicked Grant Devine sat awake in his room at the Sportsman Motel in the town of Kelvington (pop. 900). Whether it was the beginning or the end of a long day is unknown, but he was definitely stressed out.
It had been just over a week into what was shaping up to be a grueling provincial election campaign. Despite the fact CBC had just released poll results suggesting a win was well within his grasp, Devine was not convinced.
Each room in the Sportsman Motel boasted a bedside rotary telephone, perched on a nightstand screwed into the wall. That’s how Devine ended up unwittingly screaming through the motel’s paper thin wall, directly into the ear of the newspaper reporter asleep in the room next door.
“IF I LOSE THIS IT’S GOING TO BE DAMN TOUGH FOR MULRONEY NEXT TIME AROUND!”
Devine shouted into the receiver, likely at Doug Wise, Mulroney’s federal Minister of Agriculture.
Jolted awake from a dead sleep, the reporter, who had been assigned to follow Grant Devine on the campaign trail, fumbled for a pen. Mulroney must announce at least a billion dollars in aid for farmers or, Devine shrieked, the federal Tories would lose a loyal conservative government ally in Saskatchewan.
A few hours later, rising in the House of Commons, an increasingly unpopular Brian Mulroney would announce one billion dollars in aid for western Canadian agricultural producers.
“Grant Devine had asked his Ottawa Tory friends for help,” wrote longtime Saskatchewan conservative operative Dick Spencer in his book Singing the Blues: The Conservatives in Saskatchewan. “Then, in an open-necked plaid shirt and cowboy boots country costume, he stumped the province taking credit for every dollar.
Why not?”
In 1986, Brian Mulroney saved Grant Devine’s political career and handed him a second term with that one-billion dollar promise to farmers.
In 1988, the Supreme Court ruled that Canada’s founding French-language laws still applied in Saskatchewan, so technically any of the province’s laws written solely in English were invalid. It stated that the Saskatchewan government had to rewrite all provincial laws in French, or change provincial law to state English-only laws were valid.
Devine decided to do both.
This would not only appease Mulroney, who desperately needed every Canadian premier onside with his French-English unity push, but it gave Devine’s government the opportunity to make some money for its friends and donors. That is how Saskatchewan was introduced, thanks to Eric Berntson’s backroom machinations, to the money-losing failure that was GigaText.
Grant Devine had agreed to sign the Meech Lake Accord, despite the fact he had no reason to believe it had the support of Saskatchewan residents. He’d also obediently supported Mulroney’s nationally panned proposed GST.
By the midway point of 1990, construction on Rafferty-Alameda dam was back in full swing, because Mulroney’s government was still purposely, studiously ignoring Devine’s deliberate snub of federal court judgments and Canadian environmental law.
Perhaps former Reform MP Elwin Hermanson, who would later go on to lead the Saskatchewan Party, put it best when he rose in the House of Commons in Ottawa in 1995 to speak to that year’s Quebec referendum:
“Premier Devine sat at the table and said: "I will go along with this Meech Lake accord idea, but I want something for it"… he said: "I will sell my soul for a billion dollars.” I spoke shortly after that decision with an aide of one of his MLAs. This was during the time of the GST debate when the federal government was trying to implement the GST. I said to this member's aide: "Why did our provincial government agree to lend support? Why are we going on with the GST and why are we going along with the Meech Lake accord concept?" Very honestly this assistant said: "You have to do something to get a billion dollars." - Reform MP Elwin Hermanson, House of Commons, November 30, 1995
Hermanson refused to provide a name, but a smart gambler would put money on that aide to one of Devine’s MLAs being Brad Wall.
Are you seeing the pattern here yet?
As the smash hit Pretty Woman was wrapping its record-breaking theatrical run, Devine and his government had bucked the time-honored tradition of warring with Ottawa. This was refreshing for some Saskatchewan residents. The premier’s willingness to cooperate with the Prime Minister’s office had undoubtedly yielded rewards, at least for Saskatchewan’s rural voters.
Mel Gibson and Goldie Hawn teased moviegoers with their chemistry in Bird on a Wire, while Driving Miss Daisy had just cleaned up at the Oscars. Gremlins 2 and Back to the Future III were also in theatres, hallmarking the era of the cinematic sequel.
Canadian blind guitarist Jeff Healey was a darling of the North American music scene, to the extent he declared the accolades for his work that poured in from the likes of George Harrison, Eric Clapton and other legends “boring”.
Mulroney was licking his Meech Lake Accord wounds as “Step by Step” by the New Kids on the Block soared to the number one spot on Billboard charts, which they shared with the likes of Roxette, Phil Collins, Wilson Phillips and Bell Biv DeVoe.
New episodes of Cheers, Roseanne, Full House and Murder She Wrote kept Saskatchewan residents glued to their TVs as they hotly anticipated upcoming season premieres of their favorite sitcoms. The Simpsons and Married… With Children were delighting and horrifying curious viewers on FOX.
Brad Wall, John Gormley, Reg Downs, Kevin Doherty and Jason Wall are just a handful of the Saskatchewan men heavily influencing provincial politics today who, as the Nineties dawned over Saskatchewan, were working behind the scenes in the Legislature for Grant Devine.
Watch for Saskatchewan In the 90s Chapter 2: July - December 1990, arriving in your inbox in the coming weeks.