Timeline: How Liberals' teacher contract bill could be turned into law
The Nova Scotia House of Assembly will meet this morning as the Liberal government seeks to introduce a bill to impose a contract previously rejected by the province's 9,300 teachers.
- UPDATE: The introduction of the bill was delayed Monday morning after Liberal House Leader Michel Samson told reporters there were talks underway to find another solution other than legislation.
Talks between teachers and the Nova Scotia government broke off Nov. 25. Teachers had planned to begin work-to-rule job action today across Nova Scotia.
However the province said Saturday the job action would mean unsupervised classrooms and not having staff overseeing the arrival and departure of students, and cited safety as the reason for shutting schools down.
Imposing a contract on the union would take away teachers's right to strike or take other job action since those measures are specifically outlawed once a valid contract is in place.
Here is the expected timeline of that legislation:
10 a.m. Monday
Education Minister Karen Casey intends to introduce the bill to impose a contract on teachers. Since it will be the first reading of the bill, MLAs won't be able to debate it Monday. CBC Nova Scotia's legislative reporter Jean Laroche says it will likely be a short legislative session as a result.
Tuesday
Casey will bring the teacher contract bill back for second reading. That's when the debate will start. The 17 members sitting on the opposition side of the house will be able to weigh in on the proposed legislation.
Wednesday
Any Nova Scotian with a view on the bill will be able to present to the committee. This process could take days. When the controversial Bill 148 went to the same committee last year, it ended up going back to the House for a line-by-line reading.
Thursday and Friday
The Law Amendments committee could continue until the end of the week, possibly into the next week.
NSTU president Liette Doucet told CBC's Maritime Connection on Sunday that the union is encouraging teachers to speak at law amendments. She says members of the NSTU executive will be speaking and she hopes teachers will be able to present in the evenings.
"There are many, many teachers who want to be there," Doucet said.
