Mr. Speaker, today I rise to commemorate the contribution of Mathieu Da Costa to the building of this country.
Mathieu Da Costa was the first recorded black person in Canada, renowned today for his work as an interpreter and the role he played by bridging the gap between the cultural and linguistic languages between 17th century French explores and the Mi'kmaq people.
Tomorrow we will meet the award winners of the Mathieu Da Costa awards program. This initiative is a partnership between the multiculturalism program of the Department of Canadian Heritage, the Canadian Teachers' Federation and the Canadian Museum of Civilization.
By encouraging students from some 15,000 schools across this great country of ours to learn about the contributions of Canadians of diverse backgrounds, the Mathieu Da Costa awards program fosters a sense of Canadian identity and bridges the gaps between Canadians of all origins.