Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to provide some history behind the reason that we celebrate Pink Shirt Day. I have adopted a post from the Northern Mosaic Network that speaks to this history.
Pink Shirt Day began in a small town in Nova Scotia in 2007. Pink Shirt Day started as a movement by students and teachers at a school that decided to wear pink shirts in support of a 2SLGBTQIPA+ student after they were bullied, harassed, and threatened for wearing a pink shirt.
Pink Shirt Day is often overlooked and overshadowed by the focus of anti-bullying having moved away from addressing homophobia that the students face in our schools often by their peers and sometimes adults in their school communities. Regardless of how you choose to recognize Pink Shirt Day today, please take the time to make sure that you're reflecting that this day started as a reaction to address homophobia and not just anti-bullying and though days of allyship are -- like today are important, active allyship is standing up against homophobia on days when you're not asked to wear a pink shirt and you likely won't get recognition.
Students in our schools across the territory still suffer from homophobia, biphobia, and transphobia, and our communities need to come together and help create safer, healthier, and supportive communities for our young 2SLGBTQIPA+ people. As one of the founders of the Northern Mosaic Network, Jacq Brasseur, likes to remind people every year Keep the day, Keep the gay, in Pink Shirt Day. I'll have questions for the Minister of ECE. Thank you.