There will no doubt be many tributes to John F. Conway’s immeasurable impact on Saskatchewan politics, as well as his teaching and mentorship of generations of Saskatchewan students as Professor of Sociology at the University of Regina. Indeed, to fully capture the sweep of John’s influence on the political history of the province is beyond my capabilities. Instead, I would like to recount an episode in John’s life that can give readers some sense of how important he was to the socialist critique that once animated this province and how dangerous John’s enemies believed him and his arguments to be.
John would be one of the most prominent public voices to emerge out of the Saskatchewan Waffle—the movement that sought to transform the NDP into a real socialist alternative. But John’s socialist critique would spare no political party. Throughout the 1970s John was an ardent public critic of the direction of the Saskatchewan NDP government, making his case in print, radio and television media across the province. In fact, John’s critique of the NDP was so sharp, that the NDP cabinet collectively refused to appear on Counterpoint, a CBC phone-in show that John co-hosted from 1971 to 1975. John’s son, Aidan Conway, told me that his father was “as proud of his enemies as his friends.” With the election of the Grant Devine Conservative party in 1982, John would have the opportunity to make enemies like no other.
Devine’s Minister of Communications, Gary Lane, appears to have had a peculiar perspective on his job. While formally tasked with overseeing Saskatchewan’s communications infrastructure and regulation, Mr. Lane decided that the job also entailed being a vociferous media critic. Despite moving on from the communications portfolio, to Attorney-General and then Finance Minister, Mr. Lane seemed to believe that those jobs also required him to be a watchdog of the province’s media content. His archival record is chock full of letters to provincial and national news media outlets accusing them of bias and unfairness to the Devine government. If he wasn’t a government minister, some of it could be seen as almost comical, as when he derided the CBC for the views expressed by Clare Powell in a Leader-Post column as “vitriolic hatred of the provincial government.” Mr. Lane would be gently corrected in a subsequent letter from the CBC that he had confused CUPE executive assistant Clare Powell for CBC writer Larry Powell.
Mr. Lane appears to have been an early advocate of what Republicans in the United States call “working the refs.” That if you cry left-wing bias loud enough and often enough, you can force journalists and their editors, who are ever fearful of seeming unobjective, to give your side positive coverage. Indeed, given the volume of letters to various media outlets within Mr. Lane’s archives, one wonders where he found the time to do his actual Ministerial jobs. But there would be no media figure more reviled by Mr. Lane than John F. Conway. Why Mr. Lane was so obsessed with John is a mystery. Professor Emeritus Lorne Brown, a long-time comrade of John, speculates that maybe he had never encountered a real socialist before. As Lorne told me, the Devine Tories “really despised left-wing intellectuals,” and perhaps no one fit that picture in their minds better than John. The fact that this “left-wing intellectual” also had a prominent media platform probably contributed to their disdain.
According to a statement written by John in September of 1986, Lane first complained about John’s presence in the provincial media in 1983 over the appearance of John in an episode of CBC TV’s 24 Hours, that covered the first year of the Devine government. Disturbingly, John notes that since that complaint, he had not again been invited on to a CBC Television broadcast for three years. Another complaint was lodged by Lane with the CRTC against a CBC Radio appearance made by John in 1985. However, Lane’s single-minded quest to remove John’s voice from public debate would approach another level by 1986.
As then-Leader-Post columnist Dale Eisler recounts, Lane would send four letters to CBC Regional Director Ron Smith decrying what he called “a lack of professionalism or left-wing bias,” with “a major source of Lane’s displeasure,” being John Conway, “who he identifies as an NDP partisan.” On April 23rd, Lane writes to Smith, attaching a copy of an article John had written for Briarpatch Magazine. Citing the article, Lane asks Smith if the CBC “is well served in its search for “balance” by allowing a man to masquerade as a “commentator on resources, when he considers the Premier of the province “a menace” who is “unfit to govern?” Lane goes on to state that “You know my opinion on Mr. Conway’s appearance on the CBC. I believe the article in question provides ample evidence that the man has no role to play as a “commentator” in any media.” While Lane’s complaint almost seems quaint today given the rhetoric regularly used against politicians by today’s media commentators, it is important to note that Lane clearly states that he believes John has “no role to play as a commentator in any media.” As this controversy unfolds, Lane will regularly respond to criticism that he used his political power to influence the media with the excuse that he just wants “political partisans” to be so identified when they appear in the media. As the above statement demonstrates, such a concession did not appear to apply to John’s commentary. Lane would send an additional letter to Smith regarding John’s Briarpatch article in May, stating “I believe the CBC would be better served by presenting people with less bias, and more expertise in the area they are commenting on.”
According to an ACTRA grievance letter on John’s behalf, in August of 1986, a CBC producer informed John that Ron Smith, Regional CBC Director, had dictated that due to complaints from prominent persons, John was to no longer appear on-air at the CBC despite still being under contract. Keenly understanding the dangers to a functioning democracy of allowing politicians to dictate who and what the public can hear, John launched a vigorous public defence. Accusing CBC management of buckling to government pressure to blacklist him and effectively silence a public critic of the government, John sought to expose Lane’s abuse of power as well as CBC management’s complicity. As Lane’s April 23rd letter went public, criticism of Lane and CBC management mounted. The University of Regina Faculty, the United Church of Canada Saskatchewan Conference and the Saskatchewan Association of Human Rights denounced Lane for political interference and CBC management for acquiescing to that interference. The Grain Services Union, Saskatchewan Government Employees Union and the Saskatchewan Federation of Labour also publicly supported John’s reinstatement.
While John’s grievance against the CBC would ultimately be resolved in March of 1987, CBC management would deny that they had ever succumbed to political interference and even stated they would welcome John back on the air—provided he was “balanced” with an opposing perspective. Unfortunately, according to his family, John never appeared on CBC again. Instead, CBC management would continue its long failed practice of trying to placate Canada’s right-wing with inevitable results. Mr. Lane, apparently not satisfied with his role in banishing John from Canada’s public broadcaster, decided John also had no business in Canada’s national newspaper. A few weeks after the CBC controversy unfolded he was back at it again, this time writing to the publisher of the Globe and Mail claiming they “had been conned” by John for running a piece of his that would subsequently appear in the NDP’s Commonwealth Magazine. Once again, Mr. Lane was gently assured by publisher Norman Webster that the Globe had merely obtained first rights to the article, and that others were free to reproduce it with John’s consent, as is normal practice. For someone who fancied himself as the Tories’ resident media critic, Mr. Lane appears to have had little understanding of actual media practices. Facing dwindling support for the Progressive Conservatives heading into the 1991 provincial election, Mr. Lane would resign from cabinet and accept an appointment as a judge on Saskatchewan’s Court of Appeal—a position he himself created as Justice Minister.
John F. Conway would continue to speak and write on provincial politics from a socialist perspective—although never again for the CBC. In a few years, John would begin his time as an elected Regina School Board Trustee, a position he would hold for two decades, using his powerful voice to advocate on behalf of accessible and inclusive public education. He would continue to teach sociology at the University of Regina, where his ideas and teachings challenged generations of Saskatchewan students—and convinced a fair number as well—myself included.
Some might view this entire episode as evidence of defeat. A lone left-wing voice silenced by the powers that be without any real recourse to justice. Moreover, the silencing of a socialist voice that would be sorely lacking as the SK NDP under Roy Romanow jettisoned any modicum of social democracy for increasingly conservative positions.
I see it differently. I see it as evidence of what one person can achieve through sustained, yet principled public argument. John’s public commentary absolutely bedevilled a sitting government and one of its ministers. Make no mistake, if John was advocating some banal centrism, there would be no controversy. While we can never know why John was such a target of the Devine government, I believe it has something to do with the fear an authentic socialist voice with a public platform instilled in an increasingly panicked Devine government. As an unrepentant socialist, John would probably not want to dwell on the actions of one individual, particularly himself. But if John F. Conway is an example of what one socialist with a microphone and a keyboard can accomplish, think of all that we could do if even a few of us followed his example. In 2015, John wrote presciently that “the future is ominous and uncertain,” while fully in agreement, perhaps it would be a little less so if more of us lived lives as devoted to justice and solidarity as John did.
Special thanks to Professor Emeritus Lorne Brown for taking the time to speak with me about John’s life. Quotes are drawn from documents obtained via the Provincial Archives of Saskatchewan, Gary Lane Fonds, F9, Communications 1982-1991, 3011 CBC Issues General: 1985-1991, 3012, CBC Biased Reporting: Feud between J. Conway and Lane. Other quotes via the Regina Leader-Post.
A Celebration of John F. Conway’s life will be held at the Wa Wa Shriners Upper Hall, 2605 Hamilton Street in Regina, SK on May 11th at 2:30 pm.
