Across Canada, people are taking a stand in support of public water and against the privatization of our water resources. It is time to unite and get rid of bottled water.

We would love for you to join the Coalition for Bottled Water Free Communities (made up of the Canadian Federation of Students, the Sierra Youth Coalition, the Council of Canadians, the Canadian Union of Public Employees and the Polaris Institute) in the countdown to Canada's third Bottled Water Free Day! On March 15, 2012, campuses and communities across Canada will be mobilizing to take action to kick the bottle and back the tap! We want you to be a part of it!

In a month or so, the Ontario Court of Appeal will hear a case that will set important legal standards for P3s in Canada, and determine whether municipalities can hide behind the complexities of such schemes to subsidize private developers while ignoring public procurement rules.

At issue is a P3 scheme to privatize Lansdowne Park which is arguably the City of Ottawa's most valuable public asset. You may have skated by it on the Rideau Canal -- a world heritage site.

The City has decided to give most of the park to private developers for commercial development while subsidizing their investments and losses in football and hockey franchises.

At a time when the Chilean public has taken to the streets in defence of public services, the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan has increased its investments in private water in Chile. The Council of Canadians finds this deplorable. In a new wave of privatization that began in December 2010, the Chilean government sold off most its shares in water utilities. There is currently only one public water utility remaining in the entire country.

Notably, amidst the protests in defence of public education that have been ongoing since April, the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan this July increased its ownership of ESSBIO from 51.1 per cent to 89.5 per cent and ESVAL from 69.8 per cent to 94.2 per cent.

I was in Athens over the long weekend attending some meetings. Here are some further notes from a beautiful but deeply troubled country.

July 2, 2011: A discussion over lunch with a senior adviser to the Greek government.

On how long it will take for Greece to recover from the current debt crisis: "It is going to take us 10 to 12 years to work our way out of this. And then we'll be okay."

This month more buildings were added to the list of disappearing affordable housing in Vancouver. On May 1 the Colonial and Seaview hotels were privatized, with rents now scheduled to increase significantly in the coming months. For two years the buildings were run by the Portland Hotel Society on a non-profit contract with the private owners. According to the new building manager of the Colonial Hotel, the $375 rent in the 170 units is now scheduled to increase by a minimum of $50 in smaller units and "exponentially more" for larger units.

The Post-secondary Education in Crisis conference recently took place in Ottawa.

James Turk, Executive Director of the Canadian Association of University Teachers, presented 'Universities in crisis: What are the problems and what faculty and students can do.' This is a video of his presentation.