WHAT: Canada’s leading water expert Maude Barlow will be joined by Sarah Harmer in Toronto on Friday, as part of a 14-city coast-to-coast tour to launch her new book Boiling Point: Government Neglect, Corporate Abuse, and Canada’s Water Crisis (ECW Press, September 2016). Boiling Point is a timely and insightful guide for elected officials, environmental organizations and residents seeking to protect freshwater in Canada and in Indigenous communities.
WHO: The book launch will feature Maude Barlow and Sarah Harmer for a discussion of Canada’s water crisis
WHEN: 7:00 p.m. EDT, Friday, September 23, 2016
WHERE: Trinity-St. Paul’s United Church, 427 Bloor Street W., Toronto, ON (Map)
WHY: The water crisis is front and centre in Toronto, including the severe drought throughout the region this summer, a variety of challenges facing the Great Lakes, and the ongoing debate about the Line 9 pipeline. The Trudeau government is reviewing environmental and freshwater protections gutted by the former Harper government. The federal government has announced public consultations about environmental assessment processes in 19 cities, which began September 19 – the same day that Barlow’s new book was published.
ABOUT SARAH HARMER
Sarah Harmer is an award-winning musician and a celebrated environmental activist. In 2005, Harmer co-founded PERL (Protecting Escarpment Rural Land), an organization which campaigned to protect the Niagara Escarpment from a proposed gravel development which would see some parts of wilderness near the escarpment removed.
ABOUT MAUDE BARLOW AND BOILING POINT:
Boiling Point: Government Neglect, Corporate Abuse, and Canada’s Water Crisis (ECW Press, September 2016) is Maude Barlow’s 18th book. It lays bare the extent of Canada’s water crisis and argues water policies will become the defining issue of the next decade.
“The water crisis is at our door here in Canada. All the issues we thought so far away are upon us now,” writes Barlow in Boiling Point. “It is time to abandon our false beliefs that Canada has unlimited supplies of water, that Canadians have taken care of this water heritage and one another or that we still have lots of time to do so. We need a strong, national plan of action based on a new water ethic that puts water protection and water justice at the heart of all our policies and laws.”
One of the world’s foremost water activists, Maude Barlow has been on the front lines of the planet’s water crises for the past 20 years. An expert on the subject, she has worked with governments and organizations around the world to protect this precious resource.
“Maude Barlow is one of our planet’s greatest water defenders,” says Naomi Klein, author of This Changes Everything and The Shock Doctrine. “This book has all the facts, forceful analysis, and moral clarity that Canadians will need to wake up and join this most urgent of struggles.”
Barlow is the national chairperson of the Council of Canadians and Washington-based Food and Water Watch, a councillor for the World Future Council, a board member for a number of influential organizations and has previously acted as Senior Advisor on Water to the 63rd President of the UN General Assembly. Her work has earned her an impressive 14 honorary doctorates and numerous awards and recognitions.
Copies of the book are available for journalists upon request.
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