HALIFAX/OTTAWA - On Wednesday April 29, the Polaris Institute and CUPE Nova Scotia will release new findings exposing Federal Government spending on bottled water. Participating in the release will be members of the Nova Scotia Coalition ‘Turn on the Taps and Ditch the Bottle’.
The findings provide specific details on the use of public money for bottled water and compare the full amount of Government bottled water expenditures with equivalent costs for building public water fountains and investing in water infrastructure in First Nations communities.
The report will be released on the closing day of the CUPE Nova Scotia annual convention. Meanwhile, the Canadian Bottled Water Association (the beneficiaries of Government spending on bottled water) will open their annual convention in Halifax.
Also on Wednesday, the Council of Canadians and the Canadian Union of Public Employees will launch in Halifax a ‘Blue Communities Project’ tour of the Atlantic provinces to promote bottled water bans, water as a human right, and municipal opposition to public-private partnerships.
Date and time: Wednesday April 29, 2009, 12:30
Location: Holiday Inn Harbourview, Dartmouth, McNab B Room
Who: Danny Cavanagh, President CUPE Nova Scotia
Meera Karunananthan, National Water Campaigner, Council of
Canadians
Geri Leblanc, Director for Aboriginal Members of the Public Service
Alliance of Canada, Atlantic Region
-30-
For more information or to arrange interviews contact:
Joe Cressy, Polaris Institute, 613-668-5542, joecressy@polarisinstitute.org
John McCracken, CUPE Nova Scotia, 902-880-8057, jmccracken@cupe.ca