By Avnish Jolly, Winnipeg : In Canada, a penny is a coin worth one cent, or 1⁄100 of a dollar. According to the Royal Canadian Mint, the official national term of the coin is the “one-cent piece”, but in practice the term penny or centis universal. Originally, “penny” referred to a two-cent coin. When the two-cent coin was discontinued, penny took over as the new one-cent coin’s name.
Penny was likely readily adopted because the previous coinage in Canada (up to 1858) was the British monetary system, where Canada used British pounds, shillings, and pence as coinage alongside U.S. decimal coins and Spanish milled dollars. In Canadian French, the penny is called a cent, which is spelled the same way as the French word for “hundred.” Slang terms include cenne, cenne noire or sou noir (black penny) although commonQuebec French usage is sou. Canada’s first penny was struck in Ottawa in 1908 by Lady Grey, the wife of Lord Earl Grey, of Grey Cup fame, and a penny was really useful in every day shoping.
In March 2012, the Government of Canada tasked the Royal Canadian Mint to cease the production of pennies, effectively discontinuing the coin. The final penny was minted at the RCM’s Winnipeg, Manitoba plant on the morning of May 4, 2012. After announcing the demise of the one-cent coin in his budget earlier this year, federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty struck the last penny at Winnipeg’s Royal Canadian Mint on Friday. Flaherty pressed the button that produced Canada’s last copper-coloured coin that cost more to make than it’s worth.
Flaherty and Winnipeg MP Shelly Glover, the parliamentary secretary for finance, called on Canadians to gather their pennies and donate them to charity. Friday’s penny ceremony marked Flaherty’s first visit to the Winnipeg coin factory. He called it a “modern, vibrant” facility that has been able to innovate and stay competitive.
Mint workers, officials, security and visitors applauded the historic moment at the facility on Lagimodiere Boulevard.
No workers will lose their jobs as a result of the Canadian penny’s extinction. The mint makes coins for half the countries in the world, said Flaherty. On Friday morning, the mint got an order from Ghana for 40 million coins.
“Over time, inflation has eroded the purchasing power of the penny,” Flaherty said before the last cent was struck. Flaherty and Winnipeg MP Shelly Glover, the parliamentary secretary for finance, called on Canadians to gather their pennies and donate them to charity.
The saying “penny-wise, pound foolish” lost its value Friday as Canada’s last foolish one-cent coin was pounded into extinction in a move most have hailed as wise.