The Ontario Liberal government is tabling back-to-work legislation in the college strike.
In a statement Thursday, premier Kathleen Wynne said the union and college council "reached an impasse in negotiations" and have not agreed to binding arbitration, so she has decided to table legislation that would force instructors back to the classroom while the outstanding issues are referred to binding mediation.
Wynne said unanimous support of the legislation would have meant students could return to class on Monday morning.
But the NDP blocked a government attempt to table the bill after the normally scheduled time period for introducing legislation Thursday evening.
The Liberals will now ask the Speaker to reconvene the legislature Friday, when it normally does not sit, so the legislation can be introduced.
The Liberals say the House could sit through the weekend until the legislation is passed.
Earlier Thursday, college faculty voted to reject the latest offer from the college council. The premier met with both sides in the afternoon, after which talks resumed for a couple of hours, leading to the latest development.
OPSEU, the union representing striking faculty, reacted to news of the back-to-work legislation Thursday night.
OPSEU President Smokey Thomas told reporters they were not pleased with the legislation but were happy that the students will be back in class.
Still, Thomas says the fight is far from over. "This is but one battle in a war," he said.
He also called on the college council to be disbanded.
"It's a 50-year-old management structure that's been broken for 49 of those 50 years," Thomas said.
About 12,000 faculty members have been on strike since mid-October, affecting the semester for half a million students at 24 colleges.
Statement from Premier Wynne:
We have said repeatedly that students have been in the middle of this strike for too long and it is not fair. We need to get them back to the classroom.
This afternoon I met with representatives from OPSEU and the College Employer Council (CEC). I asked them to work together to find a path forward that would see students return to class by Monday. I asked the parties to work to resolve the issues between them, either through a negotiated agreement or by submitting to voluntary binding arbitration. All agreed to attempt to find a resolution by 5pm today.
Unfortunately, we have heard from the parties that they have reached an impasse in negotiations and that they have not agreed to binding arbitration. That's why we are immediately tabling legislation that would end the dispute and return Ontario college students to the classroom where they belong. Under the proposed legislation that we're introducing today, all outstanding issues would be referred to binding mediation-arbitration.
We urge both opposition parties to unanimously support our legislation, so that students and faculty can return to class on Monday morning.
Statement from NDP Leader Andrea Horwath:
"I will not support back to work legislation. I want students back in classrooms Monday, and I want that achieved through a deal.
It looks like Kathleen Wynne wanted to use anti-worker back-to-work legislation all along. She spent barely an hour at the table today, after doing nothing for five long weeks.
The reason we're in this mess to begin with is because Premier Wynne and her Liberal government have failed to properly fund post-secondary education for years, putting Ontario last in Canada when it comes to per-student funding.
The premier has the ability to call the legislature back, and the NDP is prepared to sit through the weekend to debate this move.
College students across the province missed out on five weeks of class, have been put under financial strain, and have had to put their life plans on hold because Kathleen Wynne refused to lift a finger to help bring the parties back to the negotiating table. Now that this has become a political problem for the Liberal party, she is ramming through reckless back-to-work legislation.
New Democrats will not support any legislation that takes away the rights of any workers in this province. Kathleen Wynne is failing both college students and their instructors with her actions today. This does not solve the problem she created."
Statement from PC Leader Patrick Brown:
"This is now the longest college strike in Ontario history. Kathleen Wynne has allowed it to drag on at 24 public colleges across the province, affecting over 500,000 students who have been caught in the crossfire.
"The Ontario PCs have been vocalizing our concerns about the college faculty strike since day one. With today's results, we are truly disappointed. This is not fair to students.
"I called for action at the beginning of the strike to bring both sides back to the bargaining table. Kathleen Wynne could have stepped in earlier to fix this, starting on October 15. Instead she waited weeks before weighing in.
"The fact that this has lasted until today, November 16, is unacceptable.
"My message to the Premier is this: as her meeting with both sides failed to produce concrete results and a negotiated settlement, we will support back-to-work legislation to get students back in class on Monday. It is the right thing to do for students.
"We hope there will be support for this across all partisan lines."
(with files from the Canadian Press)