Ontario's tartan ambassador

Published on Monday 14 February 2005 12:10

TORONTO – The life-size poster of Mel Gibson as William Wallace in Braveheart that greets visitors to the Ontario parliamentarian's office is the first clue that something fiercely Scottish is afoot.

For Bill Murdoch, the Progressive Conservative member of Ontario parliament for the constituency of Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound - "Bruce County is named after Robert the Bruce, you know" - being a Canadian of Scots descent is extremely important.

So much so that Murdoch, a 60-year-old beef cattle farmer from the rugged country northwest of Toronto, is championing an Ontario provincial tartan.

"The Scots were a big part of the settlement here. It was the Scots, Irish, English and French that settled Ontario," he says.

Murdoch helped to bring Canada's most populous province its annual Tartan Day in the early 1990's, a ceremonial occasion that falls on 6 April this year.

"I just think it's important to celebrate our culture like everybody else. That's why we did Tartan Day. We have Robbie Burns Day, but that's different. It was still a Scottish tradition, but it was a little different," he says. "It wasn't my idea - there already was Tartan Day in Nova Scotia - and they mark it in some parts of the (United) States, but I thought it was important to do something in Ontario, too."

Inspired by a former Tory colleague's unsuccessful bid for an official Ontario tartan a decade ago, Murdoch is hoping to convince Premier Dalton McGuinty's Liberal government to give the province another official symbol like its flower, the trillium, or its stone, the amethyst.

"The people of Ontario should have the right - if they want it - to wear an Ontario tartan as a kilt or as a tie or whatever," he says, emphasizing all Ontarians would be eligible to wear the tartan, not just those of Scottish descent.

The tartan, which is already available from kilt suppliers on the web, boasts a distinctive navy blue and forest green with flashes of red and white. It was designed by Jim MacNeil, chairman of Scottish studies at Ontario's University of Guelph.

Murdoch, whose own tartan is from the Clan Macpherson, says he is optimistic Premier McGuinty will support his non-partisan efforts and ensure passage of the legislation in Ontario's provincial parliament at Queen's Park in Toronto later this year.

If the Tartan Act becomes law in Ontario, the tartan would then be taken to Scotland, where it would be catalogued and listed in an official Scottish tartan registry.

While he acknowledges he is a bit of a professional Scotsman - he was invited to attend three different Burns Suppers this year, but was snowed in on his farm - Murdoch admits he has a dirty little secret about Scotland.

"I've never been there," he says, adding his family has been in Canada for longer than he can remember. "I never got to go. I always think there must be a castle there that I have to go and reclaim."

Asked why he has never made the pilgrimage, he shrugs.

"You've got to have time to go. Well, we have a family and I have a job and that's on top of running the farm. I spend a good month or month and a half in the summer doing all my hay, because I do it myself. Plus I have to run to all these different events (as a provincial parliamentarian)," says Murdoch.

"And in winter, it doesn't really attract me to go to Scotland. You want to go where it's warm. I would think it would be dumb to spend my money and go to Scotland to freeze when I can freeze here. I prefer to go to Cuba when it's cold!"