Speech to the Gemini Awards
Gordon Sinclair Award for Broadcast Journalism
Awarded to Ron Haggart - presented by Paul Jay
Oct 28, 2000

It was a late Saturday night, in the spring of 1971. Reporter Ron Haggart had a final meeting with the leader of the most serious prison riot in Canadian history. The inmates of the Kingston Penitentiary had reached their limit with conditions they considered intolerable. Guards held hostage, readied for the worst. Outside, police cars everywhere - a few hundred army troops surrounded the building. Haggart and a few lawyers had been summoned by the prisoners to mediate. Now it was down to Ron and the leader of the uprising. Outside the walls, they could hear the soldiers readying their weapons, preparing to charge.

Why this journalist, why trust this guy?

The answer is simple. Ron Haggart's known as a man who loves the truth and cares about people.

Haggart was famous. He wrote a column that made politicians shudder. He didn't just report. He fought. Against injustice, lies, bureaucracy. His work inspired many, including a 10 year old Toronto kid, who had no idea that someday he'd help Ron found a new TV show.

Haggart has guts. As editor-in-chief of the UBC student paper, he fought for freedom of speech and against political repression during the rise of McCarthyism. As a young Vancouver city reporter, he rocked the police department with a scathing expose. His 1971 book- Rumours of War- criticized Pierre Trudeau's handling of the October Crisis.

By the early 70's, Haggart was a star of Canadian journalism, mentioned in the same breath with such legends as Pierre Berton and Nathan Cohen. Certainly enough careers for one lifetime. But for Ron, this was just a warm up.

He left full time print, and made a television film that won the Edward R. Murrow award for a local documentary.

Then Moses Znaimer had this idea about a local Toronto TV station. Ron was the second person he hired right after the ad salesman.

For 3 years, Canada's Lou Grant helped reinvent local television news.

In 1975 Ron was the second person hired by Peter Herndorf to create the 5th Estate. For the next 13 years he helped reinvent the investigative documentary. Journalists like Brian McKenna, Hana Gartner, Adrienne Clarkson, Susan Teskey and Eric Malling were nurtured with now famous Haggartisms (to do this right, I should smoke a few packs of cigarettes):

"if you don't get the little things right, no one will believe you on the big things"

"the research file for any fifth estate item should be enough to write a book"

"what everybody knows is usually wrong"

Fifth Estate producers who worked for Haggart describe the experience as something like boot camp with Socrates.

Haggart loves facts and he loves language. And what he loves, he defends. His letters to the editor are renowned. Here's a sample from the 1980.

'A reviewer in The Globe and Mail refers to speakers before the Empire Club pledging their fealty to Her Most Imperial Majesty, Victoria, . . . . ' - Haggart readies his dagger.

'The Empire Club was founded (as the reviewer points out) in 1903, but Queen Victoria (as the reviewer does not point out) died in 1901, making it somewhat unlikely that luncheon speakers ever pledged loyalty to her beneath a banner that said Empire Club'.

Ron Haggart Senior Producer The Fifth Estate CBC Television Toronto '

And woe to the newspaper editor who drops the 'u' in glamour, thinks Canadian judges use gavels or that Canadian military personnel salute while hatless.

Ron retired from CBC in 1991. Did I say the word 'retired'? I don't think so.

It was at that time Ron reentered my life. I knew him from his work as the first exec producer of Witness. I went to him as said " would you like to do a debate show together?" He said sure. We proposed a show with opinionated hosts that represented the true breadth of the political spectrum. Only the CBC had the nerve to do it, and Michael Harris and Slawko Klimku gave us a go ahead. We put the unlikely pair of Judy Rebick and Clare Hoy together and created Face Off. For the next five years Ron helped reinvent the television debate show.

When Face Off finished its run, Ron and I sat with Tony Burman and Maria Mironowitz and created a debate program with an opinionated, left wing, irreverent host. In today's environment, perhaps an even gutsier move by CBC, and surely Ron's participation helped give us confidence to make counterSpin a reality.

So now, after more than 40 years of outstanding and innovative journalism, ask Ron what's his greatest achievement.

He goes back to those sleepless nights at Kingston Pen. There he was, standing between 400 rioting prisoners, their hostages and the Canadian army. After four days inside the prison, Ron emerged with a deal.

He won a National Newspaper Award for his coverage of the events. But that's not what makes him proud. It's the fact that many people could have died, and they didn't.

It's my honour and privilege to present the Gordon Sinclair Award for broadcast journalism, to a man who loves the truth and cares about people . . . Ron Haggart.