The Council of Canadians is calling on Ontario’s teachers to pressure their pension fund manager to divest from private water services in Chile, taking the issue directly to teachers.
The social justice group has set up an information station at the Air Canada Centre as 20,000 teachers attend a Toronto District School Board professional development day.
“Ontario teachers support the fight for public water services in the province and teach their students about the urgent need to support the right to water around the world,” says Maude Barlow, national chairperson of the Council of Canadians and a fellow of the Ontario Teachers’ Federation. “So how is it possible that Ontario teachers are represented by a pension fund that betrays these efforts, and supports a private water services industry in Chile that is undermining the right to safe, clean public water in that country?”
The Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTPP) owns $1.1 billion worth of private shares in Chilean water and sanitation utilities. The Council of Canadian says the OTPP support for water privatization runs counter to basic principles of social justice, human rights, and sound investment.
“There is growing concern about the privatization of water services around the world as large, for-profit utilities move in to take over the delivery of water and wastewater services from the public sector,” says Council of Canadians national water campaigner Meera Karunananthan. “The Council of Canadians is calling on the OTPP to begin a process to sell its shares in stages in these companies to the Chilean government and return to the state and its people their water rights.”