Liquid Assets: Privatizing and Regulating Canada's Water Utilities

In Liquid Assets, a book released today by the University of Toronto, environmentalist Elizabeth Brubaker calls for the privatization of Canada's water and wastewater utilities.

Arguing that public provision has not served Canadians well, Brubaker cites a litany of problems with the country's water and wastewater services. Underfunded, badly operated, and ineffectively regulated, hundreds of municipal systems threaten public health and the environment, Brubaker charges.

More than two years have passed since contaminated water killed seven people and made 2,300 ill in Walkerton, Ontario. "People widely referred to Walkerton as a wake-up call, but many utilities and regulators are still sleeping," says Brubaker, who authored a study for the inquiry into the tragedy.

From Newfoundland, where 193 communities must boil their water, to BC, where the number is still higher, water providers regularly expose millions of Canadians to unsafe drinking water. Even major cities are not immune: Vancouver residents with weakened immune systems face a standing order to boil their drinking water.

Public utilities in some of Canada's largest cities likewise foul harbours, lakes, and rivers with untreated sewage.

Liquid Assets examines privatization in England, France, and the United States. It concludes that the sale of treatment plants or the contracting out of their operations and maintenance has often brought capital investment, expertise, innovation, and efficiency to utilities. It has also brought stricter regulation, by curbing the conflicts of interest that prevent governments that own, finance, or operate water systems from enforcing the laws that govern them.

Liquid Assets, released by the University of Toronto's Centre for Public Management, is one of a series of monographs on public policy and public administration. Series editor Andrew Stark, Professor of Strategic Management and Political Science, calls the book "a vital and timely entrant in the debate."

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News

The Center for Public Integrity
"Hard Water: The uphill campaign to privatize Canada's waterworks"
Eye Magazine
"A different shade of green"
The Financial Post
"Private water runs dry"
"Abusing the public's trust"
"A thirst for privatization"
"Unsafe water act"
Halifax Chronicle-Herald
"Privatization of harbour cleanup way to go"
Hamilton Spectator
"Privatization went wrong from start"

National Post
"Canada's best public policy books vie for award"
Saint John Telegraph-Journal
"Privatize water utilities: lobbyist"
The Vancouver Sun
"From sea to slimy sea"

Foreword

Preface: Too Many Tragedies

Introduction: A Rising Tide

Part I: Lessons Learned

Chapter 1. Centuries of Experience: The Private Provision of Water and Wastewater Services in the United States
Chapter 2. Two Success Stories: Atlanta, Georgia, and Indianapolis, Indiana
Chapter 3. The Proof in the English Pudding: Debunking the Myths About Privatization in England and Wales
Chapter 4. Eau No: The Deficiencies of the French Model of Privatization

Part II: Where's Canada?

Chapter 5. A Growing Crisis: The Need for Private-Sector Involvement in Canada's Water and Wastewater Systems
Chapter 6. Testing the Waters: Early Experiments with Privatization
Chapter 7. What Went Wrong? Water and Wastewater Privatization in Hamilton, Ontario

Part III: Making Privatization Work

Chapter 8. Turning Losers into Winners: Bringing Workers Onside
Chapter 9. There's Nothing like a Hanging: Creating Incentives through Legal Liability
Chapter 10. Unnatural Monopolies: Lessons on Competition and Economic Regulation from England and Wales

Conclusion: How Far Should We Go?

Endnotes

Index

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Click for larger photo

Elizabeth Brubaker is the executive director of Environment Probe, a Toronto-based environmental think-tank. Brubaker has spoken and written extensively on water - including its pricing, allocation, regulation, and quality - during the last decade. She has also participated in a number of regulatory hearings regarding water, including the Demand-Supply Plan Hearing in the early 1990s (the environmental assessment of Ontario Hydro's nuclear and hydroelectric expansion plans) and the Walkerton Inquiry, for which she prepared a study on water utility privatization.

Brubaker is the author of two other books: Greener Pastures: Decentralizing the Regulation of Agricultural Pollution (2007) and Property Rights in the Defence of Nature (1995). She has contributed chapters to 13 other books published in five countries. She has also written extensively in the popular press about water, sewage pollution, agriculture, fisheries, endangered species protection, the siting of controversial facilities, and other environmental issues.

Environment Probe is a division of Energy Probe Research Foundation, one of Canada's leading environmental and public policy research institutes. Established in 1980, the foundation is often viewed as a maverick, taking positions that are sometimes out of step with other citizens' groups. The foundation has always championed market mechanisms and sound, democratic processes to protect consumers and the environment. Liquid Assets - exploring the promise of water utility privatization within a strict regulatory environment - continues that tradition.

Contact Elizabeth Brubaker by telephone: (416) 964-9223 ext. 232
or by e-mail: ElizabethBrubaker@nextcity.com

Donner Prize Nomination

In April 2003, Liquid Assets was shortlisted for the Donner Prize, the award for the best book on Canadian public policy. The shortlist was drawn from a field of 75 submissions examining a range of policy issues.

Grant Reuber, Chairman of the Donner Prize jury, noted, "In an accessible manner, this year's nominees challenge our understanding of the Canadian status quo and explore the options we have in addressing difficult and controversial issues that affect us all."

"Liquid Assets is a first-class book on an important subject. Intriguing, well-written and meticulously documented, this book provides an authoritative and readable study of the privatization of water and waste-water facilities around the world." - Donner Prize jury

Ordering information

Liquid Assets is available for $24.95 through bookstores or through Environment Probe.

To order Liquid Assets, please e-mail tovechristensen@nextcity.com and let her know:

Your name, address, phone number and e-mail address.
How you would like to pay. We accept Visa, MasterCard, American Express, or a cheque.
If paying by credit card, please call (416) 964-9223 ext. 253, and give Tove the type of card, the number on the card, the expiry date, the name on the card, and the order details. If you prefer to send this information by mail or fax, please feel free to do so.
In Canada, add GST and shipping costs. (For packages of less than 1 kilogram, Canada Post charges between $4.85 and $7.82, depending on your location. Ask us for details.)
Everywhere else, allow for current overseas shipping prices. (Ask us for details.)

Environment Probe, 225 Brunswick Avenue, Toronto, Ontario M5S 2M6
Phone: (416) 964-9223 Fax: (416) 964-8239

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