Canadians are marking the country's fourth annual National Day for Truth and Reconciliation on Monday.
Coinciding with Orange Shirt Day, the federal statutory holiday is a day to remember the more than 150,000 First Nations, Inuit, and Métis children forcibly removed from their families and placed in Canada’s residential school system. The day also honours the survivors of residential schools, their families and communities.
The church-run, government-funded residential schools operated in Canada between the 1880s and 1996. Children at the schools were subjected to systematic racism and suffered physical, sexual, and emotional abuse at the hands of staff. The National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation has so far identified more than 4,100 children who died at the schools, most due to malnourishment or disease. However, the number of dead is believed to be much higher.
The federal government declared September 30 as the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation in 2021. Prince Edward Island, the Northwest Territories, Nunavut, and New Brunswick have also designated September 30 a provincial statutory holiday. Ontario, under the Ford government, has declined to follow suit.
As a federal statutory holiday, federal government offices, Service Canada, and banks will not be open and there will be no mail delivery as Canada Post workers get the day off. Other federally regulated industries will also be observing the day.
Schools remain open, as do the bulk of privately owned businesses such as grocery stores and retail outlets.
Flags outside of many government buildings will be flown at half staff to mark the day and there will be numerous events in honour of Indigenous Peoples held across the country, including a 90-minute ceremony on Parliament Hill on Monday afternoon.
Radio broadcasters across Canada including Blackburn Media, the owner of CKNXNewsToday.ca, are once again joining together with the Gord Downie & Chanie Wenjack Fund to amplify and elevate Indigenous voices with "A Day to Listen 2024" programming. The 12-hour broadcast will share stories from Indigenous leaders, residential school survivors, Elders, musicians, and teachers. This year’s theme is All My Relations, a term used by some Indigenous Peoples of Turtle Island to express that everything - humans, animals, insects, plants, and inanimate objects - are interconnected. Hosts include Canadian singer-songwriter Julian Taylor, Mohawk/Tuscarora writer January Rogers, and Mohawk/Anishinaabe kwe executive producer of Words and Culture Kim Wheeler.