HALIFAX, N.S. — Nova Scotia’s fledgling NDP government is facing its first real test on the labour front, the outcome of which will come under close scrutiny as hundreds of public sector contracts come up for renewal in the months ahead.

With the province’s 900 community college faculty and staff poised to strike Oct. 20, Premier Darrell Dexter pledged Friday to review a union proposal for binding arbitration.

The Nova Scotia Teachers Union made the offer Thursday.

Dexter said the Labour Department would look at any proposal the union brings forward and he promised to decide next week whether to enter into negotiations on the terms of an arbitration process.

Union president Alexis Allen welcomed the premier’s response.

“It’s a positive note that he will at least consider arbitration,” she said. “But he hasn’t talked to us.”

A strike would suspend classes for 25,000 students at 13 campuses across the province.

As well, a walkout could sour relations between the NDP and the province’s labour movement, which is eager to capitalize on its close ties with the ruling party.

The premier made it clear that while he’s open to the possibility of an arbitrated settlement, he also put a condition on the table.

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Nearly 3,000 Manitoba Hydro employees are leaving picket lines and heading back to work.

A strike by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 2034 ended late yesterday afternoon when a tentative contract agreement was reached between the union and management for the Crown corporation.

“Workers will be returning to work tomorrow,” Hydro spokesman Jim Peters told the Winnipeg Sun minutes after the agreement was reached about 4:30 p.m.

Information on the deal — which has yet to be ratified through a membership vote, possibly to be held today — was not immediately available.

The strike began last Friday at 6 p.m., and was the first walkout by Manitoba Hydro staff in the utility’s approximately 50-year history. Wages were a major issue.

Hydro spokesman Glenn Schneider refused to divulge details of the agreement before the union’s vote, noting that would take place in the next 24 hours.

“And then we hope things will return to normal,” Schneider said.

“Some of the shifts will start toward the end of the day.”

Officials with IBEW did not return calls for comment. However, the union says on its website that the deal provides “a fair general increase for all members” during a period of less than three years.

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Toronto Public Library workers, members of the Toronto Public Library Workers Union (TPLWU), CUPE Local 4948 have voted overwhelmingly to strike, giving their bargaining committee an 86 per cent strike mandate.

“We have been negotiating with the Library since April and have not been able to come to a fair agreement. We want to maintain the kind of high quality community-based public library services our patrons have come to expect, and at the same time ensure that all library workers have good jobs”,  said Maureen O’Reilly, spokesperson for TPLWU and Chair of the Bargaining Committee for Local 4948.

“We believe that in this round of bargaining, the Toronto Public Library is at a crossroads,” said Maureen O’Reilly. “The Toronto Public Library is relying more and more on part-time work and self check-out machines at the expense of a well-trained professional workforce and quality service. Library workers need good secure full-time jobs just as much as our communities need great public libraries.”

Almost 50% of the workforce is part-time with fewer benefits. It takes a library worker on average five to six years to get a full-time job at the Toronto Public Library. Recent trends in the direction of public library services show little sign of progress.

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Debate on a private member’s bill banning replacement workers during labour disputes came to a halt Thursday afternoon when about 100 trade unionists, dozens of them striking Steelworkers from Sudbury, were ejected from the Ontario Legislature.

The union members were escorted from the visitors’ gallery after cheering -and jeering -several times in response to MPPs’ comments, despite repeated warnings from the House speaker not to “participate” in the debate.

The audience grew rowdy when a government-side MPP defended the Liberals’ position that anti-replacement worker legislation would further damage businesses in Ontario.

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