Province Declares Day Of Remembrance For Queen - Federal Government Declares A Stat Holiday

If you were hoping to get this coming Monday off - with pay - to commemorate the passing of Queen Elizabeth II on the day she is laid to rest it will all depend what type of workplace you are in.

If you work for an employer that is federally regulated this coming Monday has been declared a statutory holiday by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

If you work for an employer that is provincially regulated, the majority of workers in Saskatchewan, then you are encouraged to remember the late Queen Elizabeth II but you won’t be getting a day off to do it.

On Tuesday the Prime Minister announced that this coming Monday - when Queen Elizabeth II will be laid to rest - as a federal statutory holiday to allow individuals to mourn and remember the legacy of the late monarch who sat on the British thrown for 70 years.

Not only is Queen Elizabeth the British monarch but she is also Canada’s head of state. Canada is a constitutional monarchy.

Official portrait of Queen Elizabeth II - courtesy the Government of Canada

The Prime Minister, in saying the need to remember and mourn was important, said he would also work hard with his provincial counterparts to see Monday declared a provincial statutory holiday allowing workers who are provincially regulated the day off.

“We will be working with the provinces and the territories to try and see that we're aligned on this. There are still a few details to be worked out, but declaring an opportunity for Canadians to mourn on Monday is going to be important,” Prime Minister Trudeau told reporters on Tuesday.

Despite wanting the provinces to follow suit and declare Monday as a statutory holiday in Queen Elizabeth’s honour many provinces, including Saskatchewan, have said they will ask for it to be a day of remembrance but workers will not be getting the day off to do so.

"Her late Majesty's seven decades of selfless public service is an honourable legacy…We will pay tribute to her incredible dedication and commemorate her 70-year reign in a memorial service in our capital city - the Queen City,” Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe said in a release announcing there will be no provincial statutory holiday in Saskatchewan.

Queen Elizabeth II was the longest ever serving British monarch. She became Queen on February 6, 1952 until her passing on September 8, 2022 at the age of 96.

The Queen’s late father was George VI the former Prince Albert, Duke of York just prior to ascension to the British throne.

Prince Albert became the Monarch after his brother King Edward VIII abdicated the Crown in order to be with the woman he loved the divorcee Wallis Simpson, an American socialite, who had already divorced her first husband and was working to divorce her second husband at the time of her love affair with King Edward VIII.

Queen Elizabeth II was not only the longest serving British monarch but also the longest ever serving female monarch in the world at the time of her passing.

Her eldest son Charles, became the now serving Monarch Charles III at the time of his mother’s Queen Elizabeth II’s death.

Queen Elizabeth II will be laid to rest at a state funeral on Monday September 19th.