Land & Sea Journal

10 provinces and 3 territories.

Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia joined Confederation (the “Dominion of Canada”) in 1867.

AP Style spells it out in full: Canada. It is never abbreviated in running text.

Ottawa, Ontario. Population: ~1.1 million (city); ~1.5 million (National Capital Region, including Gatineau, QC across the Ottawa River).

Why Ottawa? Queen Victoria selected it in 1857 as a deliberate compromise — far enough from the US border (~100 km) to be defensible, and positioned on the Ontario–Quebec border to balance anglophone and francophone interests, avoiding the rival claims of Toronto and Montréal.

Proximity to major cities: Montréal (~200 km, ~2 hrs); Toronto (~450 km, ~4.5 hrs); Quebec City (~475 km, ~4.5 hrs). Roughly 10 million Canadians — about a quarter of the population — live within a half-day’s drive.

Political concentration: Over 130,000 federal public servants work in the National Capital Region, alongside Parliament, the Supreme Court, all federal ministries, foreign embassies, and the Governor General’s residence (Rideau Hall).

Military & security: Home to National Defence Headquarters, RCMP HQ, and CSIS HQ. CFB Petawawa (one of Canada’s largest army bases) is ~150 km away; CFB Trenton (major air hub) ~200 km.

Economy: The federal government drives roughly 40–50% of Ottawa’s local economy. The region is also Canada’s second-largest tech cluster after Toronto — Shopify is headquartered there — contributing approximately 4–5% of national GDP.

English and French. Quebec is officially francophone (84% of Quebec); New Brunswick (30%) is Canada’s only officially bilingual province. In other provinces, French is spoken by 1–5% of the people.

55% of Canadians have English as their mother tongue and 20% (8 million people) have French. About 5% have a Chinese language as their mother tongue (under 2 million people) and 4% a South Asian language.

95% of Canadians speak English or French regularly at home.

King Charles III (since September 2022), represented federally by the Governor General and in each province by a Lieutenant Governor.

The Prime Minister, who leads the party (or coalition) holding the confidence of the House of Commons. Mark Carney assumed office March 14, 2025 for a four-year term.

The Crown, the Senate (105 appointed seats), and the House of Commons (338 elected seats).

First-past-the-post (FPTP): each of the 338 ridings returns one MP; the candidate with the most votes wins regardless of whether they hold a majority.

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), an independent federal regulator.

• The Globe and Mail (Toronto) — ~1 million subscribers
• National Post (Toronto) — ~350,000 subscribers
• Le Devoir (Montréal) — ~75,000 subscribers
• La Presse (Montréal) — ~350,000 digital subscribers

The Canadian Press (CP / La Presse Canadienne), a not-for-profit cooperative owned by its member news organisations.

• CBC / Radio-Canada (public broadcaster) — funded ~$1.4 billion annually by the federal government. Flagship English newscast The National averages ~650,000 viewers per episode; CBC News Network draws ~500,000 daily viewers. French arm Téléjournal (Radio-Canada) is the leading French-language TV newscast.
• CTV News (Bell Media) — CTV National News is Canada’s most-watched English evening newscast, averaging ~1.1 million viewers. CTV News Channel is its 24-hour cable service.
• Global News (Corus Entertainment) — Global National averages ~750,000 viewers. Global News also runs a streaming news service.
• CP24 (Bell Media) — Toronto-based 24-hour rolling news channel with a national digital reach.
• TVA Nouvelles (Québecor) — Leading French-language private TV news network, based in Montréal.

Approximately 41 million (2025 estimate).