The Nineties In Saskatchewan: An Introduction

Some might say they don't need one.

On the vast expanse of the Canadian Prairies lies a province with a rich and storied history – Saskatchewan.

The modern history of the province that’s hard to spell but easy to draw is embryonic. We’ve got a handful of decades under our belt. This, compared to the thousands of years of recorded history of places like Europe and Asia, where the political seeds of the Western world and eventually, Saskatchewan, were germinated.

A land of breathtaking landscapes, resilient communities, intricate political dynamics and Tommy Douglas’s Medicare, Saskatchewan emerged again as a focal point of Canadian politics in the 1990s, though at times for the wrong reasons. It was a time of profound change, as the province navigated economic uncertainty, the unraveling of government criminality, political upheaval and social transformation.

Like many of you, I was a teen in Saskatchewan in the Nineties. My interests were Pearl Jam, Party of Five, flannel shirts and baby doll dresses.

I wasn’t paying attention to what was happening with the government.

If you are any kind of politics watcher today, you might even know the exact number of Saskatchewan schools and hospitals closed by the Saskatchewan NDP in the Nineties (52). The vast majority of those closures were in rural Saskatchewan, generating a bitterness towards the NDP that still wafts through its wide open spaces today. 

However, that’s where the tale of the Nineties often begins and ends — and that’s a problem.

Those hospital and school shutdowns played out alongside a parade of criminal courtroom dramas involving Devine’s cabinet ministers and MLAs, as well as backroom operators who are still, inexplicably, working in the Legislature with the Sask Party today.

When Grant Devine took office, Saskatchewan’s finances were fantastic. He went on to deliver consecutive deficit budgets and drastically increased spending, including on money-losing megaprojects and corporate subsidies.

Over the course of a decade, Saskatchewan's debt grew from $3.5-billion in 1982 to $15-billion in fiscal year 1991–1992. That’s almost $30-billion in 2024 dollars.

Far worse, by 1991 the province’s annual interest payments had exceeded $500-million and were the third largest line item in the provincial budget after health and education.

As the 90s dawned, Saskatchewan was virtually bankrupt.

It was also a hotbed of social movements and cultural expressions. Indigenous rights activism, environmental advocacy, and LGBTQ+ rights campaigns gained momentum, challenging the mainstream discourse and pushing for a more inclusive and equitable province.

As we delve deeper into the intricacies of Saskatchewan politics in the 1990s, we are confronted with a narrative that was both unique to the province and reflective of broader trends in Canadian society. The legacy of this transformative decade continues to reverberate in the debates, decisions and dynamics of contemporary Saskatchewan.

Its legacy can’t be properly defined, however, until the historical narrative is corrected, both through retellings like this one and hopefully more down the road.

Even though the facts on the Nineties are well recorded in solid sources like the Legislative Assembly Hansard and thousands of archived news stories, they have also become almost wholly subjective to the storyteller. The truth has been obscured by rhetoric to the point that the narrative has become accepted as factual.

Saskatchewan was on the brink of receivership. Yet the fiscally-necessary school and hospital closures are what have captured our attention and emotions.

What will follow this Introduction is a chronological, fact-based reconstruction of what happened in Saskatchewan politics in the Nineties. Should you choose to subscribe, together we’ll examine the events that greatly impacted the trajectory of each political party in Saskatchewan and by extension, the province itself, as they were happening both behind closed doors and in the public eye.

Then you can decide the truth about Saskatchewan in the Nineties.

Nobody’s here to demonize Grant Devine and his government, but it’s no spoiler alert that the facts on what happened are simply appalling. It is shocking that a politician and leader as inept as Devine, regardless of what he did or didn’t know about the criminality under his nose, has been embraced and welcomed back into the fold by any political party.

This is also not about vindicating Roy Romanow and his government. Same principle applies - the facts will speak for themselves. It’s just a damn shame that Romanow and his party went out of their way to not share those facts with you. There was a toxic arrogance behind Romanow and his party’s refusal to explain their decisions, seemingly driven by the notion that Saskatchewan people knew Grant Devine was fiscally reckless, but voted for him for a second term anyway.

One thing that may become abundantly clear, by the time you’re finished reading this series, is that since Tommy Douglas, the Saskatchewan NDP have not been able to communicate effectively with the people of this province.

An examination of the Nineties in Saskatchewan raises questions about why the province is where it is today.

• Why did the Saskatchewan NDP allow their own party history to be appropriated and rewritten by their political opponent? 

• Who started the hyperbolic and often misleading school and hospital closure narrative, when and why?

• How bad were Saskatchewan’s finances in the Nineties, really?

• Why was the Saskatchewan media unable to uphold the public record?

• Was the Saskatchewan Party born from necessity, or was it simply a vehicle created to save Bill Boyd’s political career?

This work is not based on a whole bunch of one-on-one interviews and eyewitness accounts. As we’ll learn at more than a few stops over the course of this journey, pretty much everyone involved in the Nineties in Saskatchewan has had plenty of opportunities to be heard.

Problem is, they’re often telling different stories.

I have interviewed Lynda Haverstock extensively over the years and drawn greatly from those conversations — I may even share some of the audio. I’ve interviewed other players from that era, including former Devine and Romanow cabinet ministers… who, even today, don’t want to be named.

The Nineties were a brief but golden age in journalism in Saskatchewan, so this series draws heavily from the archives of the Saskatoon Star Phoenix, Regina Leader Post and CBC Saskatchewan. Each of those newsrooms enjoyed a roster of dozens of journalists, with multiple individuals covering the Saskatchewan Legislature.

I have written and compiled this information over the course of the last ten years. The purpose was once a book; in fact, circa 2017 I was in discussions with editors and publishing houses about going down that road.

I walked away from it.

Let’s just say the process was severely tainted for me, rightly or wrongly, by what I was experiencing in Saskatchewan, at the hands of many of the same people who stood to be rather embarrassed by the contents of what I will publish.

It needs to be released, however. It’s weighing me down.

The first chapter is titled Prologue: The Eighties, from there we’ll start with Chapter 1: 1990. Most years will be split into two chapters and my goal is to publish a new chapter every two to three weeks. The majority of the writing is already done, but I’ll be refining it along the way.

My hope for readers of this new publication is that you come away from this exercise with a new, in-depth understanding of an era in Saskatchewan that was as dramatic, complex and nuanced as it was stupid.

I also hope you’re entertained, because it’s a story that is, at least at times, comedic in its buffoonery.

Mindblowing in its audacity.

Nauseatingly greedy.

It is a tale that is maddeningly, scandalously and boldly corrupt.

Above all, it is one that is quintessentially Saskatchewan: driven by a tiny population, no degrees of separation and a political culture entrenched in fear and insecurity.

The Nineties were pivotal, complex and nuanced, like virtually every other decade of the few Saskatchewan has under its belt. However, they were also strikingly simple in so many ways, particularly when compared to the vitriolic, complex and destructive environment in the Saskatchewan Legislature today.

I hope you enjoy it.