Despite the attack on her, the Canadian Treasury President remains optimistic about the possibility of reaching a reasonable solution with public employees and ending their strike.

On this sixth day of the strike involving 155,000 federal government employees, Federal Treasury Board President Mona Fortier repeated that she still has high hopes of reaching a "good and fair agreement for public employees and reasonable for Canadians."

Fortier said she is ready to make concessions, adding: "That's how negotiations are."

"There are ongoing issues. There will be pressures. I think we are in the right place. It's just a matter of knowing how we will reach the end," Fortier said this morning in a radio interview with Radio Canada.

The weekend was marked by tensions between the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC / AFPC) and Justin Trudeau's Liberal government.

The union spoke of a "lack of respect" towards its members and a "lack of will" on the part of the government, in addition to directly challenging Trudeau and Fortier by telling them what can be translated as "get out of your stupidity!".

Without returning again to the words said about her, Fortier and her negotiating team are keen on "putting efforts on the table".

For his part, University of Ottawa law and management professor Gilles Lévesque believes that public tensions can contribute to mobilizing the ranks of government employees represented by the union.

"They (the tensions) give them the incentive to strike and mobilize. If we know the dispute will be resolved quickly, it will be difficult to rally people (employees). Often, blaming the other side is a motivating factor," Lévesque said in a radio interview with Radio Canada as well.

"A critical week"

Lévesque believes the coming days will be very important. "Next week will be critical," he said.

"When the strike lasts more than two weeks, it really affects citizens," Lévesque added, so "a solution must be found by next Friday, whether for union members who want to return to work and receive a salary, or for the government that wants to show a good public image of an active community."