Provincial government employees begin trickling back to their regular workplace on Monday after almost three months of working from home.

Finance Minister Tom Osborne says employees who have been identified to return to the workplace will be contacted by their supervisor in the coming days.

Any employee who is not contacted should continue in their current work arrangement unless advised otherwise.

Osborne says about 20 per cent will return under Alert Level Three, but government is still evaluating the results of the virtual workplace.

He says some were more productive working from home while others may not have been. Osborne continues that workers who have had the highest level of productivity at home will likely be among the last to be called back. He notes government will be looking at ways to reduce their footprint moving forward.

Osborne’s remarks came during the fiscal update, which saw the deficit top the billion-dollar mark at the end of March. He says it’s a situation that we cannot tax or cut our way out of.