TORONTO — Ontario’s legislature is sitting this weekend as the governing Liberals push through a bill to end a strike by faculty at the province’s colleges.
It has been slow going for the government’s back-to-work bill, the opposition New Democrats opposed speedy passage of the legislation on both Thursday and Friday.
NDP leader Andrea Horwath says it would be irresponsible to push through legislation without proper scrutiny, though she has left no doubt that her party will oppose the bill in any case.
Deputy Premier Deb Matthews has accused the NDP of being cruel to students by not agreeing to swift passage of the back-to-work bill.
The legislature will sit both today and Sunday, and if the bill gets passed this weekend hundreds of thousands of students could be back in class by Tuesday.
The 12,000 professors, instructors, counsellors, and librarians went on strike Oct. 15.