Centre Block

The Canadian Parliament Buildings are the parliament buildings housing the Parliament of Canada, located on Parliament Hill, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.

The Victoria Tower was the prominent main bell tower of the original Centre Block parliament building in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. The 55-metre-high (180 ft) tower was the centre piece of Parliament Hill that was constructed from 1859 to 1866 by Thomas Fuller. It was destroyed during the great fire of the Centre Block on 3 February 1916. Its replacement, the Peace Tower, was built on the same location but the design (larger clock face, ornamental Victoria High Gothic vs. simpler Modern Gothic) and height were radically changed. The original tower bore some similarities to the tower at the Parliament Building (Quebec) (still standing).

The Parliament of Canada (French: Parlement du Canada) is the federal legislature of Canada, seated at Parliament Hill in Ottawa, and is composed of three parts: the King, the Senate, and the House of Commons. By constitutional convention, the House of Commons is dominant, with the Senate rarely opposing its will. The Senate reviews legislation from a less partisan standpoint and may initiate certain bills. The monarch or his representative, normally the governor general, provides royal assent to make bills into law. The governor general, on behalf of the monarch, summons and appoints the 105 senators on the advice of the prime minister, while each of the 338 members of the House of Commons – called members of Parliament (MPs) – represents an electoral district, commonly referred to as a riding, and are elected by Canadian voters residing in the riding. The governor general also summons and calls together the House of Commons, and may prorogue or dissolve Parliament, in order to either end a parliamentary session or call a general election. The governor general also delivers the Throne Speech at the opening of each new Parliament (the monarch occasionally has done so, instead of the governor general, when visiting Canada). The current Parliament, summoned by Governor General Mary Simon in November 2021, is the 44th Parliament since Confederation in 1867. The official languages of the Parliament are English and French.

The Parole Board of Canada (French: Commission des libérations conditionnelles du Canada; formerly known as the National Parole Board) is the Canadian government agency that is responsible for reviewing and issuing parole and criminal pardons in Canada. It operates under the auspices of Public Safety Canada.

The Peace Tower (French: Tour de la Paix) is a focal bell and clock tower sitting on the central axis of the Centre Block of the Canadian parliament buildings in Ottawa, Ontario. The present incarnation replaced the 55-metre (180 ft) Victoria Tower after the latter burned down in 1916, along with most of the Centre Block; only the Library of Parliament survived. It serves as a Canadian icon and had been featured prominently on the Canadian twenty-dollar bill directly adjacent the queen's visage, until the change to polymer.

The Library of Parliament (French: Bibliothèque du Parlement) is the main information repository and research resource for the Parliament of Canada. The main branch of the library sits at the rear of the Centre Block on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario. The library survived the 1916 fire that destroyed Centre Block. The library has been augmented and renovated several times since its construction in 1876, the last between 2002 and 2006, though the form and decor remain essentially authentic. The building today serves as a Canadian icon, and appears on the obverse of the Canadian ten-dollar bill. The library is overseen by the Parliamentary Librarian of Canada and an associate or assistant librarian. The Canadian Parliamentary Poet Laureate is considered to be an officer of the library.

Parliament Hill (French: Colline du Parlement), colloquially known as The Hill, is an area of Crown land on the southern banks of the Ottawa River in downtown Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Its Gothic revival suite of buildings, and their architectural elements of national symbolic importance, is the home of the Parliament of Canada. Parliament Hill attracts approximately three million visitors each year. Law enforcement on Parliament Hill and in the parliamentary precinct is the responsibility of the Parliamentary Protective Service (PPS). Originally the site of a military base in the 18th and early 19th centuries, development of the area into a governmental precinct began in 1859, after Queen Victoria chose Ottawa as the capital of the Province of Canada. Following several extensions to the parliament and departmental buildings and a fire in 1916 that destroyed the Centre Block, Parliament Hill took on its present form with the completion of the Peace Tower in 1927. Since 2002, an extensive $3 billion renovation and rehabilitation project has been underway throughout all the precinct's buildings; work is not expected to be complete until after 2028.

The Queen's Gates (French: Porte de la Reine) is the formal entrance to Parliament Hill, the location of the Canadian parliament buildings, in Ottawa, Ontario. Built in 1872 and set into the fence, known as the Wellington Wall, between piers designed in the Victorian High Gothic style that was fashionable in Canada at the time, the gates sit on the central axis of the hill's landscaping, in line with the Centennial Flame and Peace Tower beyond, and open onto Wellington Street. By the early 1990s, neither the piers nor the ironwork had been properly renovated since their construction; salt from the street, the freeze-thaw cycle, and pollution had damaged and disintegrated the grout and stone faces. Thus, in 1992, Public Works and Government Services Canada began a $5 million restoration project of the entire fence along Wellington, which included the Queen's Gates. The piers were fully repointed and stabilised, including their foundations, and the gates were restored and partly rebuilt by a blacksmith.

The Canadian Police and Peace Officers' Memorial is a memorial in Ottawa, Ontario, commemorating approximately 900 Canadian law enforcement officers killed in the course of their duties. Dedicated in 1994, it is located at the northwest corner of the Parliament Hill grounds, overlooking the Ottawa River. The memorial consists of the Police Memorial Pavilion, a reconstruction of a 1877 gazebo by Thomas Seaton Scott, and a glass-and-steel perimeter wall etched with the names of the fallen officers, which was designed by landscape architectural firm Phillips Farevaag Smallenberg. Initially conceived to recognize only police and corrections officers murdered in the line of duty, criteria for inclusion on the memorial's honour roll were quickly expanded to all law-enforcement officers whose deaths resulted from events associated with their duties. To accommodate the increasing number of names on the roll, the memorial was redesigned in 2000, for which it won a Professional Award from the Canadian Society of Landscape Architects. In 1998, the last Sunday in September was declared Police and Peace Officers' National Memorial Day, and starting in 2003 flags were lowered to half-mast in observance of that date. Annual memorial ceremonies attract thousands of law-enforcement officers and their families to Parliament Hill.

The Capital Pathway, also known informally as the Bike Path, is a 220-kilometre (140 mi) recreational pathway interlinking many parks, waterways and sites in Ottawa, Ontario and Gatineau, Quebec. Most of the pathway is paved, and allows an almost continuous route through the National Capital Region. The pathway was mostly the work of the National Capital Commission (NCC), a crown corporation created in 1959. The trail, which includes the Rideau Canal Pathway, the Ottawa River Pathway, and the Rideau River Pathway extends in all directions to the limits of the city of Ottawa and extends northward into Gatineau Park's lakes.

The House of Commons of Canada (French: Chambre des communes du Canada) is the lower house of the Parliament of Canada. Together with the Crown and the Senate of Canada, they comprise the bicameral legislature of Canada. The House of Commons is a democratically elected body whose members are known as members of Parliament (MPs). The number of MPs is adjusted periodically in alignment with each decennial census. Since the 2025 federal election, the number of seats in the House of Commons has been 343. Members are elected by simple plurality ("first-past-the-post" system) in each of the country's electoral districts, which are colloquially known as ridings. MPs may hold office until Parliament is dissolved and serve for constitutionally limited terms of up to five years after an election. Historically, however, terms have ended before their expiry and the sitting government has typically dissolved parliament within four years of an election according to a long-standing convention. In any case, an act of Parliament now limits each term to four years. Seats in the House of Commons are distributed roughly in proportion to the population of each province and territory. However, some ridings are more populous than others, and the Canadian constitution contains provisions regarding provincial representation. As a result, there is some interprovincial and regional malapportionment relative to the population. The British North America Act 1867 (now called the Constitution Act, 1867) created the House of Commons, modelling it on the British House of Commons. The lower of the two houses making up the parliament, the House of Commons, in practice holds far more power than the upper house, the Senate. Although the approval of both chambers is necessary for legislation to become law, the Senate only occasionally amends bills passed by the House of Commons and rarely rejects them. Moreover, the Cabinet is responsible primarily to the House of Commons. The government stays in office only so long as they retain the support, or "confidence", of the lower house. The traditional meeting chamber of the House of Commons is in the Centre Block of the Parliament Hill complex in Ottawa. However, as of 2026, Centre Block is undergoing renovations; the House of Commons is therefore meeting in a temporary chamber in the West Block of the complex.

The Centennial Flame (French: Flamme du centenaire) is a monument on Parliament Hill commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Canadian Confederation. First lit in January 1967, the Flame worked with natural gas and as of 2021 uses biogas, presenting a fountain that does not freeze in winter. Money thrown into it is a donation for people with disabilities, some of whom have received over $5,000.