By Gazette Staff
March 13th, 2026
BURLINGTON, ON’
A recent legal opinion, commissioned by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), validates the numerous concerns we (Environmental Defence) have expressed about Ontario’s new Water and Wastewater Public Corporations Act. Despite government claims to the contrary, the act lacks the precision necessary to safeguard water from risky privatization.
If the government is sincere about water remaining public, it must amend the act to include a requirement that corporations be owned by a true public sector entity, like a municipality.
As the act is currently written, the term ‘public’ does not legally protect water from privatization. There is no limit to who can own these ‘water and wastewater public corporations.’ The government should align its actions with its words and amend the law. Water is not a commodity.
In Ontario, we have some of the cleanest, safest drinking water right now because water systems are something we all own and operate through our city and town governments.
Background Information
- The Water and Wastewater Public Corporations Act, 2025, under Bill 60, would allow the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing to designate corporations under the Business Corporations Act to provide water and sewage services for certain lower-tier municipalities.
- The Trillium’s piece on the recent legal opinion, commissioned by CUPE.
- Environmental Defence’s previous statement on the Water and Wastewater Public Corporations Act, Privatizing Drinking Water Could Lead to Big Bills, Bad Service and Dirty Water.
ABOUT ENVIRONMENTAL DEFENCE (environmentaldefence.ca): Environmental Defence is a leading Canadian environmental advocacy organization that works with government, industry and individuals to defend clean water, a safe climate and healthy communities.
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Our water is only safe if it is managed by union employees working for wasteful and inefficient utilities owned by wasteful and inefficient municipalities.
The provincial government obviously has not taken a look at the experience of the UK when it privatized all the water boards. It has been an utter failure not only from an environmental standpoint, but to many more importantly from a reliability, efficiency and a retail product cost basis. The same experience as it could with other UK vital services like the railways, electricity, services should not be in the hands of private enterprise.
Editor’s note: To equate the experiences in the UK with what gets done in Canada is a bit of a stretch