On December 16, Canada’s Department of Finance announced the following:

“The 2024 Fall Economic Statement announces that Terry Fox will appear on the next $5 bank note. Sir Wilfrid Laurier will move from the $5 bank note to appear on the next version of the $50 note.”

There can be no doubt that the choice of Terry Fox is both inspirational and universally applauded. However, I have to express my disappointment with the decision to move Laurier over to the $50 note.

This was a missed opportunity. A full four years ago, after extensive consultations, a short list of 8 fully-vetted banknote candidates were submitted to Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland for her final decision.

Three years later, given the slow decision making process, I proposed a radical makeover of our whole banknote system.

To move away from our veneration of political leaders and replace them with three outstanding banknote candidates representing different aspects of our Canadians experience: Terry Fox, beloved humanitarian Lotta Hitschmanova (a Jewish refugee to Canada), and indigenous leader Isapo-muxika (Crowfoot).

As I argued then, there can be no question that we live in an age of deep social rifts, exacerbated by our sometimes-vitriolic political parties, and their leaders.

So why not give the politicians on banknotes a rest — Laurier, King and Borden — and replace them with three towering individuals who represent the very best of three substantially different historical streams from our Canadian experience?

The beauty of adding Lotta, Crowfoot and Terry Fox was that all three of these iconic figures were “ready to go,” no further consultations were needed!

A real missed opportunity, I feel, and hopefully a future government one day will have a second look at this question.

David Rain