After three days of delays, Liberal government and Progressive Conservative MPPs joined forces Sunday to order 12,000 striking college teachers — and their students — back to class over NDP objections.

Faculty report for work Monday and 500,000 students follow Tuesday to jump-start a semester stalled five weeks ago by what became the longest college strike in Ontario history.

“We have some work to do to look at why the system failed students,” acknowledged deputy premier Deb Matthews, also minister of advanced education.

“We’re going to take a really good look at the process of bargaining and see if there’s any way we can prevent this from ever happening again,” she added, promising details on fund of at least $5 million to help students facing financial hardships from the strike “very soon.”

The term will be extended two weeks to Dec. 22 in many programs, the winter reading week likely will be axed, and “a week or two” will be added to the school year next spring to make up for lost time, said chief executive Don Sinclair of the College Employer Council.

“It’s going to be a very busy rest of the semester,” Joel Willett, president of the College Student Alliance, told reporters at Queen’s Park.

“They have indicated to us they are very frustrated. This deal should have been done weeks ago.”

Matthews said the semester has been “saved,” although Sinclair cautioned that students slated to finish their courses and graduate in December could face more difficulty given the time crunch.

“That will be a bit of a challenge,” he said in an interview with the Star.

Political recriminations continued after MPPs spent barely 35 minutes debating and voting Sunday on the back-to-work legislation the government had hoped to pass Thursday night, allowing time for students to return Monday.

New Democrats refused the unanimous consent required to pass the bill immediately, forcing the Legislature to hold rare extra sessions Friday, Saturday and Sunday, bringing in support staff on extra shifts or overtime.

“It could have been Monday,” Matthews said. “For people who have classes Monday, it’s another week . . . it is a meaningful delay and completely unnecessary.”

NDP Leader Andrea Horwath rejected the government’s interpretation as “spin,” maintaining the bill is “anti-worker” and deserved debate and scrutiny.

“Whether that process started Thursday or Friday makes no difference in terms of the outcome,” she said.

With a provincial election looming next June 7 and public opinion polls suggesting a tight race, Horwath was asked if an NDP government would allow such a college strike to continue indefinitely.

“I do not believe in back-to-work legislation. New Democrats don’t believe in back-to-work legislation. It’s something we fundamentally think is a breach of people’s charter rights,” she replied, referring to protections for collective bargaining that have been upheld by the Supreme Court.

Matthews quickly pounced on Horwath’s remark.

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“That’s an astonishing statement . . . the strike could have gone on forever.”

Horwath said the government should have used powers under college legislation to direct the College Employer Council to amend its negotiating positions weeks ago when it was clear a deal was not coming together with the Ontario Public Service Employees Union.

“I’m not going to presuppose what might happen in the future but what I can tell you is this . . . I would do everything . . . I possibly could do . . . to prevent a strike from happening in the first place,” Horwath added.

Union president Warren “Smokey” Thomas said he could not fault Premier Kathleen Wynne’s government for introducing the back-to-work legislation.

“If I was the premier and it was down to this particular juncture, I’d do what she’s doing,” he said in an interview. “The whole session’s in jeopardy.”

However, Thomas added he will consider a legal challenge of the legislation’s constitutionality.

Calling the strike a “catastrophe” for students, he heralded the promise of a “task force” to study issues like the fact that 70 per cent of college faculty are part-time, which was a sticking point for the union given concerns about precarious work. Academic freedom was another key issue in the strike.

The contract dispute, in the meantime, will go to binding mediation and arbitration for settlement in the coming months. The last offer from the colleges, rejected by the union Thursday with a of 86 per cent vote, included a pay raise of 7.75 per cent over four years.

Progressive Conservative deputy leader Sylvia Jones blamed the lengthy strike on both Wynne and the New Democrats.

“Unfortunately, because of the failure of the Liberal government in their action and pushing it back, and unfortunately, because of the NDP’s intransigence and refusal to actually move forward on Thursday afternoon and evening, we are sitting here today,” she said.

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