Opposition wants government apology over Tommy Douglas movie
Saskatchewan's Opposition party wants an apology from the provincial government for the way former Liberal premier Jimmy Gardiner was portrayed in a recent movie about medicare founder Tommy Douglas.
But the New Democratic government is having none of it.
Gardiner, who died in 1962, was elected premier twice, once in 1926 and again in 1934. The former premier's family and other supporters say the CBC miniseries that aired in March – Prairie Giant: The Tommy Douglas Story – portrays Gardiner in a negative light.
The film's producers received a $614,000 provincial grant last year to help make the movie about Douglas, the first federal NDP leader.
"They made Jimmy Gardiner to look like 'Evil Roy Slade' and Tommy Douglas the 'Man from Glad.' To me its just a sad portrayal of our history," the former premier's grandson, Mike Gardiner, told CBC News on Monday.
Gardiner said his family is worried the movie will be used as a teaching aid in Saskatchewan schools.
"Jimmy Gardiner was really not that bad of a guy. He was one of the founders of the United Church of Canada. He fought the Ku Klux Klan in 1929," he said.
"He was a great teacher in the community, a great farmer. He loved the people, loved the farmers and loved immigrants. And this was another crack the movie took at him. They sort of made him anti-farmer and anti-immigrant, which simply wasn't the case."
Three of Gardiner's grandchildren and two cousins were at the provincial legislature Monday when the Saskatchewan Party introduced a motion asking the New Democrats to apologize for the movie's portrayal of the former premier and longtime federal agriculture minister.
The government prevented the motion from coming to a vote.
'It's full of inaccuracies'
Opposition Leader Brad Wall insisted the government must apologize and ensure the film is not used in schools.
"In its current form, it's full of inaccuracies," he told the Saskatoon Star Phoenix. "If this is destined for the classroom, I think any instructional tools need to be accurate."
While Culture Minister Glenn Hagel acknowledged the inaccuracies raised by the Gardiner family, he said he doesn't want to look like a censor. Hagel said that in any case, it would not be appropriate to apologize since the government did not influence the movie's content.
In one scene, Gardiner berates miners in the 1931 Estevan coal strike in a broadcast to the province and then invites reporters for a drink. But historians say the speech never happened, Gardiner wasn't premier during the strike and he was a teetotaller.
The producer of the movie, Kevin Dewalt, says the company did do the research, but it was not making a documentary.
"We were simply trying to show that there was incredible animosity and we had to use some creative licence to get that message across," he told CBC News.