Carney marks ‘devastating legacy’ of residential schools in Ottawa event

OTTAWA — The federal government will “match remembrance with responsibility,” Prime Minister Mark Carney promised on Tuesday, as he addressed the crowd assembled on Parliament Hill to mark the fifth annual National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.

Sept. 30, is also known as Orange Shirt Day, and is meant to honour survivors of the residential school system and those who never came home.

“We reflect on the devastating legacy of the residential school system,” Carney said in his speech at the Remembering the Children event.

“And we, as a government and as a people, we match remembrance with responsibility.”

Between 1857 and 1996, 150,000 Indigenous children were forced to attend church-run, government-funded schools.

They were barred from speaking their languages in institutions often rife with abuse and located far away from their families and communities.

An estimated 6,000 children died while attending the schools, although experts say the actual number could be much higher.

Carney’s commitment to reconciliation was not trusted by all however with some protesting at the event over the government’s new major projects legislation, known as Bill C-5.

As Carney spoke, one protester held up a sign reading, “Reconciliation? More like hypocrisy” with “C-5” written and encircled by fire.

C-5 was widely condemned by Indigenous leaders who fear it will allow the federal government to overlook their rights as it pursues development to shore up the economy.

Gov. Gen. Mary Simon, who made history in 2021 when she became the first Indigenous person to be appointed to the post, told the gathering on Parliament Hill that the quest for reconciliation has stirred her courage and, at times, her anger.

“Much more work remains,” said Simon. “Inequities persist and we share a lifelong responsibility to address them.”

Simon said she envisions a world where young Indigenous people can embrace Canada without compromising their identity.

“Where they can fully be themselves, pursue the professions they aspire to and give back to their communities, whether as teachers, doctors, nurses, plumbers, whatever you want to be. Even as Governor General,” she said.

The event in Ottawa included prayers, musical performances and speeches from residential and day school survivors.

Charlotte Nolin, a survivor of the Sixties Scoop who spoke at the event, said reconciliation is about “every Canadian.”

“We should remember these children and the lives they gave so that we could move forward as a nation,” Nolin said.

Reepa Evic-Carleton, an Inuk elder and day school survivor, said the legacy of residential schools and colonization continues “to affect our lives today.”

“I have seen how forced relocation and separation from the land has impacted us and how it created struggles with loss, grief, identity and wellness,” Evic-Carleton said.

Evic-Carleton, who was in day school for 10 years, said she wasn’t able to speak her language and practise her culture, and witnessed “very rough” treatment of students by teachers.

“I have also witnessed the strength of my people and how we continue to hold onto our culture, language and values and practices,” Evic-Carleton said.

In a media statement, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said the residential school system was “a product of a big government, ‘Ottawa-knows-best’ approach” and promised to end such government overreach.

In her own media statement, NDP MP Lori Idlout, who serves as her party’s critic for Indigenous Affairs and is Inuk, called on the federal government to do more to make reconciliation a reality.

In Toronto, hundreds of people assembled Tuesday in Nathan Phillips Square to celebrate Indigenous culture and art and remember the victims of residential schools. Among them was Carole Walsh, who said her mother was taken to a residential school near Sudbury, Ont.

“She was taken at the age of five years old from my grandmother and my aunt and my uncle,” she said, “She wasn’t allowed to speak her language. She wasn’t allowed to even sing. She was forced to speak English. She’d been sexually abused when she got into the residential school.”

Pamela Chrisjohn, who shared Indigenous agriculture practices with those attending the event at Nathan Phillips Square, said she was touched to see so many people seeking to learn about Indigenous culture and the residential school experience.

“Events like this actually open up the true history of Canada,” she said, adding that she’s seen “a very large group of new Canadians who also take a very great interest in what we’re doing.”

“I think that’s the only thing that we can do as individuals, as people, is continue to communicate, continue to share.”

Hundreds of people wearing orange took part in the Intergenerational March to commemorate Orange Shirt Day at the University of British Columbia campus in Vancouver on Tuesday.

Dana-Lyn Mackenzie, a member of the Hwlitsum First Nation and lead organizer of the march, said residential school survivors are getting older and first-hand accounts are rarer, but their families and their children still carry their trauma.

She said the march this year focuses on the important role that young people play in the reconciliation process and she hopes that they can demonstrate the resilience of the survivors.

“If we can’t stand up and demonstrate, listening to the truth and working towards reconciliation and action, then I don’t know who is supposed to be doing this,” she said.

More than a thousand people took to the streets in downtown Winnipeg to honour residential school survivors and the children who never made it home.

Manitoba Premier Wab Kinew, Southern Chiefs’ Organization Grand Chief Jerry Daniels and Assembly of First Nations National Chief Cindy Woodhouse Nepinak, provided words of reflections and encouragement.

“We walk today. We honour the legacy of what our people have been through. Every one of our families have been through it, whether it’s through residential school or through day school. We weren’t supposed to be here,” said Woodhouse Nepinak, who is from Pinaymootang First Nation in the province’s Interlake region.

Sheila Sumner said her father attended the Elkhorn Residential School, west of Brandon, where he was never able to hold on to his first language.

“He got the language beat right out of him. When he came home and had his family, he never taught them because he couldn’t speak the language anymore,” she said. “So the language is more or less lost with us. For the next generation after us it’s completely lost. So, that’s what I would like to see is our language come back.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 30, 2025.

— With files from Maan Alhmidi in Toronto, Brittany Hobson in Winnipeg and Nono Shen in Vancouver

Alessia Passafiume, The Canadian Press