The Manitoba government is fighting a court challenge launched by public-sector unions over a provincial wage freeze.

In a statement of defence filed this week, the government says it has the right to pass a law imposing a wage freeze on public-sector workers without consulting union leaders.

It says a democratically elected government has the authority to enact laws and the wage freeze is needed to reduce the deficit.

The law, introduced last spring, would impose a two-year wage freeze across the public sector as each collective agreement expires.

That would be followed by a 0.75 per cent pay increase in the third year and one per cent in the fourth.

More than a dozen unions, representing 110,000 government workers, nurses, teachers and others, filed a court challenge in July that said the government's plan undermines collective bargaining rights and violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The unions' statement of claim asks the Court of Queen's Bench for an injunction against the bill, which has not yet taken effect, and a declaration that the wage freeze is a violation of the right to collective bargaining.

Previous court rulings have upheld the ability of governments to impose collective agreement provisions, but only under certain circumstances.

In 2007, the Supreme Court of Canada overturned a British Columbia law which gutted parts of collective agreements for health-care workers. The high court ruled the government interfered in the workers' right to bargaining.

The high court ruled the government was not prevented from legislating labour provisions but, in essentially replacing negotiated contracts, it had a duty to consult the unions before it acted.

The Manitoba government's statement of defence says the province is not affecting existing contracts, and is acting within the constitution.

"The defendant states that it had no legal duty to consult or negotiate with the plaintiffs regarding the passage of any legislation," the statement reads.

"The defendant, as the democratically elected government of Manitoba, is best placed to make difficult policy choices related to the allocation of scarce public resources, including public-sector compensation, since the use of such resources has an impact beyond the parties to a collective agreement."

Even if the law is found to violate the unions' freedom of association under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the move would be justified as a reasonable limit on that freedom under the charter, the government's statement says.

No court date has been set for the lawsuit.