Workers at Amazon YVR2 in British Columbia are owed millions in back wages, according to a Labour Board ruling levied February 13, 2026.

March 22 marks World Water Day—an annual reminder that access to safe, clean drinking water is a basic human right, not a privilege.

The meteoric rise of artificial intelligence (AI) in recent years has presented new challenges for water resource management. The massive data centres that make AI possible require massive amounts of water to cool hardware. How are federal, provincial, and municipal governments determining access to clean water for some of the world’s wealthiest tech corporations and how does that impact existing domestic water priorities?

The crisis at home

Right now, 39 long-term drinking water advisories remain in effect across 37 First Nations communities in Canada. Some of these communities have gone without safe tap water for more than 25 years. Entire generations have grown up unable to drink from their own faucets. In late 2025, Indigenous leaders called the situation a “national scandal” and pressed the federal government to fast-track clean water legislation — legislation that has been delayed repeatedly.

At the same time, a January 2026 report from the United Nations University declared the world has entered an era of “global water bankruptcy.” The report warns that many water systems have been pushed past the point of recovery. In Canada, that warning should hit close to home.

Big Tech’s thirst

As communities struggle for safe drinking water, some of the world’s wealthiest corporations are locking in access to vast quantities of municipal water for AI data centres.

A CBC investigation last fall revealed that a single Microsoft data centre in Etobicoke was approved to use up to 1.2 billion litres of water per year—the equivalent of 500 Olympic-sized swimming pools. A nearby facility in Vaughan is expected to consume 730 million litres annually. Globally, data centres consumed an estimated 140 billion litres of water for cooling in 2023 alone, according to the International Energy Agency, and those numbers will only increase as AI use accelerates.

The federal government has set aside $700 million to attract data centre investment with little consideration for freshwater usage. According to the CBC investigation, the Amazon data centre in Varennes, Que., has been operating since 2018 without a water meter. It also found that a Microsoft facility in the Netherlands was revealed to be consuming more than four times its promised water allocation—while local residents were being asked to cut back.

A shared resource, a shared responsibility

Canada is rolling out the welcome mat for data centres that consume staggering volumes of clean water, while 37 First Nations communities still cannot safely drink from their taps.

No matter where you live, water is foundational to your community and your livelihood.

Unifor believes governments at all levels must take immediate, concrete steps to address this imbalance:

• The federal government must make good on its promise to eliminate all long-term drinking water advisories in First Nations communities.
• Regulatory approvals for data centres must include binding, transparent requirements for water use, including public reporting, independent monitoring, and enforceable limits.
• Municipal governments must ensure that data centre approvals do not come at the expense of residential and community water needs, especially in drought-prone regions.
• Indigenous communities must provide their free, prior and informed consent before water allocations that affect their lands, territories, or resources.

Water belongs to all of us. It is not a commodity to be consumed in secret by the world’s richest corporations while communities go without. The UN report on global water bankruptcy makes it clear that the era of treating water as an unlimited resource is over.

A group of 75 call centre workers just became Unifor’s newest telecom unit after saying, “enough is enough” with unfair pay and a lack of accountability from management

“It’s a brave thing to do, to form a union with your co-workers and take that concrete action to improve your working conditions,” said Unifor National President Lana Payne. “That’s exactly what these call centre workers did when they reached out to our union, they took the first step towards having a better job.”

The new unit is made up of approximately 75 workers at AllianceOne Ltd. In Toronto, a subsidiary of Teleperformance. The members provide customer support services for Toyota Financial Services and Echo Health.

“Many of the new members are newcomers to Canada, and they felt taken advantage of at times. By forming a union, workers can ensure that their rights on the job are protected,” said Unifor Ontario Regional Director Samia Hashi.

Other workplace issues identified during the organizing drive were different wages for workers doing the same job, a lack of consistency and communication from management, and a lack of alignment in terms of benefits with AllianceOne workers in the U.S.

Now, the newly formed union at AllianceOne will be empowered to bargain across the table with their employers and advocate for much-needed changes at work.

Racism remains deeply rooted in our country and communities, and it is the responsibility of trade unionists to confront and eliminate it and all forms of oppression that seek to divide workers.

People around the world recognise March 21 as the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination to honour and remember the victims of the Sharpeville Massacre in South Africa.

On this day in 1960, Black South Africans marched to a local police station to protest apartheid “pass” laws which limited freedom of movement.

“While we were standing there and singing, we suddenly saw the police in a row pointing their guns at us. Whilst we were still singing, without any word, without any argument, we just heard the guns being fired,” said Lydia Mahabuke, Sharpeville survivor.

The massacre, which killed 69 people and left more than 180 injured, shocked the world.

“Today, we cannot let violence, including acts driven by racism, to become something we grow numb to. With conflicts unfolding around the world and racial violence continuing in Canada, every life taken by the destructive force of racism is a terrible and preventable loss.” said Unifor National President Lana Payne.