Thousands of people gathered in Ottawa on Canada Day to mark the country’s 158th year since Confederation.
Prime Minister Mark Carney, in his first official Canada Day message said that historic moment was a bet by provinces that they’d be “stronger together than they ever could be apart.”
“They were right. They became a new federation that’s now grown into our strong, bilingual, multicultural, ambitious country,” he said in the pre-recorded message.
Carney went on to say that in the years since, Canada’s history has been marked with “inflection points” and the country now faces another moment.
“The world is changing, old friendships are frayed, our economy is being buffeted by a trade war we didn’t start,” he said. “Our values are being tested by attacks on democracy and freedoms that we must resist.”He went on to say that as the world is changing, Canadians are united and stressed the country would build a “one Canadian economy,” a phrase used by Carney as the federal government has worked to bring down interprovincial trading barriers.
The prime minister’s message was similar when he took the stage at the noon national ceremony.
“I’m particularly proud that in a world that’s fraught with division, that we under the maple leaf have considered our options and we’ve decided not to pull apart and fight, but to come together and to build,” Carney said.
“We are a country that is great because in part we know we can be even better. We’re a country that does things because they’re right, not because they’re easy. A people that see kindness as a virtue, not a weakness. And now is the time to build a Canada worthy of those values, a Canada worthy of its great people, a Canada for all and for all time.”His remarks followed performances by various artists, including Mi’kmaw performer Alicia Murrin, Metis singer Andrian Turenne and Inuit poet Taqralik Partridge, and a flyby of the Canadian Air Force Snowbirds.Canadian Identity Minister Steven Guilbeault was also in attendance and addressed the crowd ahead of the performances.
When we think of Canada, we think of its beauty, wilderness, vast, raw and stunning natural landscapes,” he said. “We see rugged coasts, lush, green forests, golden prairies, snow-capped mountains and windswept tundra. There’s no other place like Canada and we all share a sacred duty to protect it.“But Canada is far more than just a place, it’s something that we carry around in our hearts with pride.”
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