Protective casing that has kept a statue of Sir John A. Macdonald at Ontario's legislature out of the view of the public for five years will soon be removed, provincial parliamentarians on the group that dictates matters on the grounds of Queen's Park decided.
The statue of Canada's first prime minister has been boarded up since 2020 after it was vandalized multiple times.
“I’m guaranteed it will be (unboarded) this summer,” Ontario Speaker Donna Skelly said at Queen’s Park on Tuesday.
As Speaker, Skelly is chair of the provincial legislature’s Board of Internal Economy, which makes administrative decisions about the legislature and its grounds, where the statue is located.
“I can’t give you a specific date as to when the (protective) hoarding is coming off, but the first thing is cleaning and treating the statue,” Skelly told reporters.
According to Skelly’s office, a new plaque will be installed near the statue, replicating the text of signage that’s currently posted to the box-like casing covering the statue.
It states: “The Legislative Assembly of Ontario is a place for debate and deliberation on issues that matter in our Province.”
“Though we cannot change the history we have inherited, we can shape the history we wish to leave behind,” it continues.
“The Speaker of the Legislative Assembly is considering how the depictions of those histories in the monuments and statuary on the Assembly’s grounds can respect all of our diverse cultures and peoples.”
The statue was first erected in 1894, three years after Macdonald's death.
Macdonald is credited as a father of Confederation. He is also blamed for his role in creating Canada's residential school system, which many Indigenous children were forced to attend, separating them from their families.
Many statues and monuments dedicated to figures who were key to Canada's colonization, Confederation and early history have been targeted by large protests over the last several years. In 2020, demonstrations took place in Canada in parallel with protests sparked by the killing of George Floyd in the United States. The next year, Canadian protests were fuelled by a series of discoveries at multiple former residential school locations that suggested many children may have been buried on their grounds.
Several Macdonald statues across Canada have been relocated or removed in recent years, including in some cases by protesters and, in others, by local governments.
After the Macdonald statue in Queen’s Park was vandalized multiple times in 2020, the province's Speaker at the time, Ted Arnott, ordered the monument be boarded up "for its own protection."
Skelly said on Tuesday that vandalism of the statue, once its casing is removed, will not be tolerated. “If the statue is vandalized, then there will be consequences,” she said, referring to typical penalties for acts of vandalism.
A couple of years ago, Premier Doug Ford's Progressive Conservative government passed a law that had the effect of putting its fate in the hands of the Board of Internal Economy.
The board is run by a few MPPs. Speaker Donna Skelly is its chair, and a non-voting member. Its decision-making commissioners include Education Minister Paul Calandra, Government House Leader Steve Clark, NDP official Opposition house leader John Vanthof, and Liberal parliamentary leader John Fraser.
Over the last five years, there's been a recurring debate — among MPPs, media outlets and the public — about what the fate of the Macdonald statue at Queen's Park should be.
While speaking to reporters at Queen’s Park, NDP MPP Sol Mamakwa, who attended a residential school in his youth, expressed disappointment with the decision to once again display the statue publicly on Queen’s Park’s grounds. He said he felt it should have been relocated to a museum “where it belongs,” or have new signage that “represents the history: the good and the bad of who Sir John A Macdonald is and what he represents here in Canada — for everyone.”
Two weeks ago, the board's members agreed to a motion from Calandra, which Fraser seconded, agreeing "that the (protective) hoarding around the Sir John A. Macdonald statue be removed as soon as cleaning is completed, and the existing signage be erected once complete," the group's May 12 meeting minutes show.
On Tuesday, Skelly said, “Hoarding a statue hasn’t moved the needle.”
“We have to deal with it. It is part of our history,” she said. “And hopefully we will be able to come to a resolution where First Nations do feel a part of this building.”
There remained more than a dozen pairs of kids' shoes next to the encased Macdonald statue on Tuesday. Visitors have left them next to the monument over the last few years to memorialize children who were victims of the residential school system.
In explaining why she feels now is an appropriate time to remove the covering of the Macdonald statue, Skelly said, “It’s been covered for almost five years.”
“It’s a different time from when that statue was erected in 1894 … Women weren’t even considered persons. In fact, since Confederation, we haven’t had a woman Speaker — I’m the first female Speaker,” Skelly added. “This is a very different time. We cannot run away from our history.”
“I think it’s important that we reach out to Indigenous communities and Peoples and say, ‘We want you’ — I want you to feel part of this parliament, of this legislature,” she said.
Skelly said that the statue will be monitored by the legislature’s 24-7 police security, but that people will still be allowed to protest at it.
“People have the right to protest here, as long as no one is hurt, and you don’t break the rules or law, you’re welcome. This is where you should be protesting. I want to hear your views,” Skelly said.
Fraser, the Liberals’ representative on the legislature’s internal board that decided to uncase the Macdonald statue, said of the decision, “I think the sentiment is that our history, as broken as it is in some ways — the good and the bad, we have to be clear on what our history is.”
“And I think we have to acknowledge that. There’s more work to be done to acknowledge it, and that’s the reality. The reality is that there is controversy; there are different perspectives,” Fraser added.
Ontario Liberal Party Leader Bonnie Crombie, who has long been calling for the statue to once again be displayed publicly, said on Tuesday, “Our prime minister, John A. Macdonald, should not be hidden behind hoarding.”
“It’s a time that we need to confront our part and confront our history and deal with it,” Crombie added.
Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles said she hopes a conversation around “what we do with monuments like this” continues after the Macdonald statue’s unboxing.
Green Leader Mike Schreiner, whose party is short of the threshold required to be represented on the Internal Board of Economy, said he thinks Indigenous peoples should be given input into how it’s displayed.
This story was updated at 3:17 p.m. on Tuesday, May 27 to include comments from MPPs.
