Ontario Liberal leader Bonnie Crombie is calling Premier Doug Ford out for keeping a statue of Canada’s first Prime Minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, covered and out of public sight for five years.
Crombie shared a clip from her recent appearance on Toronto Today’s 640 Radio, where she said covering the statue outside of Queen’s Park for so long makes Ontario look “weak.”
“Outside Queen’s Park, there’s a statue of our very first prime minister, John A. Macdonald, the founder of our country. but you wouldn’t know that because Doug Ford put a box around him five years ago,” Crombie said on the radio show.
The province boarded up the statue with wood panels to protect it in the wake of several vandalism incidents targeting the statue following the accusation that Macdonald was instrumental in the establishment of Canada’s residential school system. The wooden box remains over the statue today.
“Now that’s crazy. we have to confront our history and not hide from it. We have to show them how strong we are, to show our pride, our pride and our past,” Crombie said. “Now. Look, our past isn’t perfect, but we have to confront it, not put a box around it. It looks weak, and we are not weak.”
In addition to the several vandalism incidents, activists laid dozens of small shoes at the foot of the statue to protest supposed discoveries of unmarked graves at various residential schools in Canada.
Despite allegations of genocide, not a single unaccounted-for body was found at the supposed “unmarked grave sites” to date.
Although not the originator of residential schooling, Macdonald’s government initiated large-scale government funding into a government-supported system in 1883, citing a desire to educate a largely illiterate Indigenous population and to integrate First Nations people into Canadian society.
In recent years, Macdonald’s connection with the schools has made his legacy a popular target for far-left activists.
Macdonald’s government also extended voting rights to Indigenous people in 1885, provided they met the exact requirements of living in and owning property in Canada as non-Indigenous voters.
Several statues of Canada’s first prime minister have been vandalized since 2020.
At least five statues of the father of Confederation were vandalized in 2020 alone. Protesters toppled his statue in Montreal and wrote expletives about Macdonald in black inc his statue in Regina, Saskatchewan.
Other “Land Back” activists vandalized a statue in Hamilton red to represent the blood of Indigenous people as a result of colonialism. While others in Baden, Ontario and Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island were similarly painted red in the same year.
Crombie’s criticism of Ford’s inaction at removing the shelter built around Macdonald’s statue at Queen’s Park comes a day after Ford suggested an early election. Ford said he would need to secure a strong mandate from Ontarians for measures economic measures in response to U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed 25% tariffs.
Ford’s statements were the closest he’s come to confirming rumours that Ontario could face an early election.
This also comes as a recent poll by Liason Strategies found that Crombie’s Liberals are trailing ten points behind Ford’s PCs in recent polls.
The poll surveyed 1,202 Ontario voters on Jan. 8-9, 2025. The pollsters reported a margin of error no greater or lesser than 2.82% 19 times out of 20.
According to the poll, Ontario’s PCs have 40% support to the Ontario Liberal’s 30%.
