Ottawa MP sends map of Canada full of errors to constituents

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A map of Canada drawn by a Liberal MP has attracted attention for omitting provinces and territories and blurring some key borders.

In a pre-Canada Day outreach effort, MP Yasir Naqvi sent his constituents in Ottawa Central a flyer with Naqvi’s contact information and a poorly rendered map to “Display with Pride!”

Missing from the blank coloring map is Prince Edward Island, the maritime province located above New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. (In fact, our smallest province has a long history of being forgotten, including in a Champlain travel book dating back to 1613, as one historian discovered.)

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On the other side of the map, the Northwest Territories and Yukon also receive little attention, represented as a single land mass with no dividing borders.

Conservative MP Michelle Rempel Garner shared an image of the flyer in a post on X pointing out these and other cartographic oversights.

“Fun time leading up to Canada Day,” the post begins. “Can you spot the error that whoever was supposed to check this shipment missed?”

Rempel Garner points out another “quite significant” oversight: the provinces of Quebec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia are grouped together as one.

“If you want to be picky, Baffin Island is depicted as a peninsula and the Avalon Peninsula as an island,” he adds.

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On Sunday, Naqvi attempted to redeem the map in a post admitting some of its shortcomings.

“#CanadaDay is coming! To commemorate this moment, we are sending you a Canadian flag to display proudly. But we made a mistake. PEI and Yukon are missing from the map. My team and I apologize,” Naqvi wrote on X.

Naqvi said the maps could serve as a teaching opportunity for young children.

“Think of it as an interactive map to teach kids our geography or to start learning more about these amazing places. From my team and I, our best wishes for a #HappyCanadaDay!”

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“No apology to New Brunswick?” responded user Steven Klaiber-Noble.

As CBC points out, the pamphlets were likely funded by taxpayers. Each MP can send up to four “household heads” or newsletters to their constituents for free.

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