New $10 bill featuring Canadian civil rights icon Viola Desmond unveiled
Source: Bank of Canada
March 8, 2018 – Halifax, Nova Scotia
Finance Minister Bill Morneau and Bank of Canada Governor Stephen S. Poloz unveiled the new $10 bank note featuring Viola Desmond during a ceremony at the Halifax Central Library. Once issued into circulation in late 2018, it will mark the first time that an iconic Canadian woman is portrayed on a regularly circulating Bank of Canada note.
This new $10 note is the first vertically oriented bank note issued in Canada.
The back of the $10 bank note features images and symbols that represent Canada’s ongoing pursuit of rights and freedoms. It features the Canadian Museum for Human Rights—the first museum in the world solely dedicated to the evolution, celebration and future of human rights. Also depicted on the note are an eagle feather—representing the ongoing journey toward recognizing rights and freedoms for Indigenous Peoples in Canada—and an excerpt from the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
To continue to celebrate more iconic Canadians, the next $5 note will also feature a new portrait subject and supporting imagery. In due course, the Bank will launch another consultation process to seek input from Canadians on the design of the next $5 note.
These changes mean that former prime ministers William Lyon Mackenzie King and Sir Robert Borden will no longer be portrayed on bank notes. The $20 denomination will continue to feature the reigning monarch.
Image: Bank of Canada
