Vancouver Sun columnist Vaughn Palmer receives prestigious Michener-Baxter honour
Palmer is one of two Postmedia journalists to be honoured with the award
By John Mackie
Last updated 1 day ago
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Vaughn Palmer has received many awards over his five-decade career at The Vancouver Sun.
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But he was dumbfounded when he received a call that he was one of two recipients of the 2026 Michener-Baxter Award “for exceptional service to Canadian journalism.”
“I was genuinely awed when they called me to tell me that Bruce (MacKinnon) and I were going to be the winners,” said Palmer.
“I’m not known for modesty. In fact, people tell you even my false modesty is fake. But on this one, I was kind of knocked over.”
The Michener-Baxter Award “recognizes individuals who have made significant contributions to Canadian journalism and public service through a career dedicated to integrity, excellence, and the public good.”
The ceremony is to be held at Rideau Hall in Ottawa on June 18.
The award is not awarded annually. It has only been handed out 14 times to 13 individuals and one organization since it was established in 1983.
Global TV’s Keith Baldrey said the honour is well-deserved, because Palmer is like “an encyclopedia of B.C. political history.”
“We sit next to each other in budget lockups, deliberately,” said Baldrey. “He is the one person in the entire room who will know the history of everything, in terms of the government’s budget history and spending habits and misuse and missteps, in an instant.”
Former premier Mike Harcourt joked that, “They should download (Palmer’s) brain before he retires.”
“The stories he could tell,” said Harcourt.
As a politician, Harcourt doesn’t always agree with Palmer. But he said his column is a must-read.
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“I enjoy reading him, even though I think he’s over the top in anti-Eby stuff,” he said with a laugh. “He was mentored by Bruce Hutchison. He comes from great lineage at The Sun.”
Hutchison was a B.C. journalism legend who was close with Palmer. Palmer points out that Hutchison’s first photo in the B.C. legislative press gallery was in 1919, and Hutchison’s last column was in 1992, the year he died.
Palmer’s career hasn’t been quite that long, but he is still going strong after 53 years at the newspaper.
Born in Gaspé, Que., Vaughn Wilson Palmer arrived in Nanaimo at 15, when his father moved west to become a B.C. Ferries captain in 1967. He got into journalism at the University of B.C. and started working at The Sun part time in 1973.
He was The Sun’s “rock ‘n’ roll” critic and city editor before becoming the legislative columnist.
“I’ve been on the political beat since 1984. So that’s 11 premiers and counting, as Baldrey and I put it,” said Palmer.
Other journalists have come and gone as well, but Palmer still loves covering provincial politics.
“B.C. politics is generous in terms of material,” he said. “You’re writing every day, and they’re doing something every day. The other thing that has been fruitful in terms of material is the dramatic contrast between the way (Premier David) Eby runs the government and the way (former premier John) Horgan did.
“That’s a lot of what we write about. You don’t need to go back to the B.C. Liberals to see the difference.”
Palmer points out there was also a dramatic contrast between two Social Credit premiers, Bill Bennett and Bill Vander Zalm.
“Vander Zalm was God’s gift to B.C. political writers,” Palmer said in 2023. “Whatever you think about what kind of premier he was, he generated staggering amounts of material and unbelievable storylines. After that, I was established as a columnist. And I’ve sort of done OK ever since.”
Palmer, Baldrey and Les Leyne of the Victoria Times-Colonist have become such fixtures in the B.C. legislature that they now give talks to the interns on that beat.
“We used to tell them Vander Zalm stories, until we realized that none of them were born when he was premier,” deadpans Palmer. “So we’ve kind of had to retire some of that material.”
Palmer is legendary for digging nuggets out of government reports. His first major scoop was when he pored through Highway Ministry reports and found that construction of the Coquihalla Highway had cost much, much more than what the government claimed.
“When Vander Zalm became premier, he ordered a public inquiry into the overrun on the Coquihalla (in 1987), which was advertised at $250 million, but ended up costing a billion dollars. And that was real money.”
Palmer will turn 74 on May 26. Others might retire and kick back to enjoy life with their family (wife Dale Ketcheson, daughter Elise and grandson Reid), but retirement doesn’t seem imminent.
“I talk to (Sun/Province editor) Harold (Munro) every year on my birthday, and I say I’d like to stay another year,” he said. “And he says, ‘Fine.’ My birthday is coming up in a couple of weeks. … I’m going to ask him if I can stay another.”
