Employee Rights
EMPLOYEE RIGHTS
Labor Pains
New Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) "canceled union contracts covering nearly 25,000 state workers Tuesday," continuing a nationwide trend towards curtailing workers' rights and undermining unions. Daniels, a former Bush administration official affectionately known as "my man Mitch" by the president, marked his second day in office by dissolving a 15-year policy – upheld by three previous governors – which allowed state employees to "negotiate pay, benefits and work rules with state officials." The governor, who simultaneously announced plans for a new Department of Child Service, said it was "an important day for children in Indiana," even though his cancellation of bargaining rights affects hundreds of workers at the state's Family and Social Services administration. Other heavily affected groups include Indiana Transportation and Corrections workers, nurses and direct care workers in the health care industry and "more than 1,000 state troopers, conservation officers and excise police officers."
BLUNT RESCINDS COLLECTIVE BARGAINING: A new conservative governor was bad news for state workers in Missouri as well. In that state, new Gov. Matt Blunt's (R) first official acts on Tuesday included an order "rescinding the collective bargaining rights of thousands of state workers." He reversed an order issued by predecessor Bob Holden (D) in 2001, which "would have permitted the collection of fees to support collective bargaining for state workers. Blunt's undoing of the agreement will affect about 9,000 state workers." Several state employee bargaining units already have the fees included in contracts negotiated by unions, but "Blunt said those contracts have no effect – an interpretation unions may challenge."
NLRB NOT DOING ITS JOB: Gov. Daniels's origin in the White House is fitting since, as The New Republic reports, the Bush administration has resumed predecessor Ronald Reagan's practice of consistently taking business's side in its often illegal attempts to undermine unions. Since Bush appointed a conservative majority in 2003, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has "taken business's side in more than 25 controversial cases," facilitating "an erosion of workers' ability to organize." According to a study of 400 union election campaigns in manufacturing plants by Cornell sociologist Kate Bronfenbrenner, "51 percent of employers in 1998 and 1999 threatened to close a plant if a union won an election, and 25 percent fired at least one worker for union activity. Bush's NLRB has balked at penalizing such companies – even though it is exactly these tactics that the [National Labor Relations] Act was created to outlaw."
SHAFTING TEMPORARY WORKERS: In the latest from the NLRB, chairman Robert J. Battista, Peter C. Schaumber, and Ronald E. Meisburg, all Bush appointees, "found that temporary workers employed by an agency cannot join the same union as regular employees without permission from the agency and the company where they work" – effectively eliminating their ability to organize. That decision reversed a 2000 ruling by a Democratic board, a bad sign for America's growing temporary workforce.
CARD CHECK: So what's the Bush administration's next move? In June, the NLRB announced it would hear a case challenging the use of "card check recognition," a crucial organizing technique which "lets unions form bargaining units at workplaces after a majority of workers sign union cards. The employer must agree to recognize the cards and unit." America's labor movement is now "anxiously awaiting" the results of that federal decision, which could "seriously impede union organizing." According to Bronfenbrenner, a board decision to make the cards illegal would "reverse the entire history of the board, the National Labor Relations Act and its practice."
CONSULTING FIRMS HELP COMPANIES UNDERMINE UNIONS: As a reminder of what companies can do to unions when left unchecked, a recent settlement involving EnerSys battery factory in South Carolina revealed a slew of dirty tactics on the part of company officials, including "firing the top seven union leaders, spying on workers, refusing to bargain and ultimately closing the 500-worker plant to retaliate against the union." The case also highlighted "a little known but thriving business in which law firms and consultants work with corporations to beat back unionization efforts." Enersys had hired a national law firm, Jackson Lewis, which describes itself as "committed to the practice of preventive labor relations." Just one of the firm's apparent tactics: an anti-union maintenance man, Tom Brown, testified that "a mysterious consultant known as Mr. X had advised him on how to oust the union and had helped him write fliers that called the union's leaders names like 'trailer trash,' 'Uncle Tom' and 'dog woman.'"
Labor Pains
New Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) "canceled union contracts covering nearly 25,000 state workers Tuesday," continuing a nationwide trend towards curtailing workers' rights and undermining unions. Daniels, a former Bush administration official affectionately known as "my man Mitch" by the president, marked his second day in office by dissolving a 15-year policy – upheld by three previous governors – which allowed state employees to "negotiate pay, benefits and work rules with state officials." The governor, who simultaneously announced plans for a new Department of Child Service, said it was "an important day for children in Indiana," even though his cancellation of bargaining rights affects hundreds of workers at the state's Family and Social Services administration. Other heavily affected groups include Indiana Transportation and Corrections workers, nurses and direct care workers in the health care industry and "more than 1,000 state troopers, conservation officers and excise police officers."
BLUNT RESCINDS COLLECTIVE BARGAINING: A new conservative governor was bad news for state workers in Missouri as well. In that state, new Gov. Matt Blunt's (R) first official acts on Tuesday included an order "rescinding the collective bargaining rights of thousands of state workers." He reversed an order issued by predecessor Bob Holden (D) in 2001, which "would have permitted the collection of fees to support collective bargaining for state workers. Blunt's undoing of the agreement will affect about 9,000 state workers." Several state employee bargaining units already have the fees included in contracts negotiated by unions, but "Blunt said those contracts have no effect – an interpretation unions may challenge."
NLRB NOT DOING ITS JOB: Gov. Daniels's origin in the White House is fitting since, as The New Republic reports, the Bush administration has resumed predecessor Ronald Reagan's practice of consistently taking business's side in its often illegal attempts to undermine unions. Since Bush appointed a conservative majority in 2003, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has "taken business's side in more than 25 controversial cases," facilitating "an erosion of workers' ability to organize." According to a study of 400 union election campaigns in manufacturing plants by Cornell sociologist Kate Bronfenbrenner, "51 percent of employers in 1998 and 1999 threatened to close a plant if a union won an election, and 25 percent fired at least one worker for union activity. Bush's NLRB has balked at penalizing such companies – even though it is exactly these tactics that the [National Labor Relations] Act was created to outlaw."
SHAFTING TEMPORARY WORKERS: In the latest from the NLRB, chairman Robert J. Battista, Peter C. Schaumber, and Ronald E. Meisburg, all Bush appointees, "found that temporary workers employed by an agency cannot join the same union as regular employees without permission from the agency and the company where they work" – effectively eliminating their ability to organize. That decision reversed a 2000 ruling by a Democratic board, a bad sign for America's growing temporary workforce.
CARD CHECK: So what's the Bush administration's next move? In June, the NLRB announced it would hear a case challenging the use of "card check recognition," a crucial organizing technique which "lets unions form bargaining units at workplaces after a majority of workers sign union cards. The employer must agree to recognize the cards and unit." America's labor movement is now "anxiously awaiting" the results of that federal decision, which could "seriously impede union organizing." According to Bronfenbrenner, a board decision to make the cards illegal would "reverse the entire history of the board, the National Labor Relations Act and its practice."
CONSULTING FIRMS HELP COMPANIES UNDERMINE UNIONS: As a reminder of what companies can do to unions when left unchecked, a recent settlement involving EnerSys battery factory in South Carolina revealed a slew of dirty tactics on the part of company officials, including "firing the top seven union leaders, spying on workers, refusing to bargain and ultimately closing the 500-worker plant to retaliate against the union." The case also highlighted "a little known but thriving business in which law firms and consultants work with corporations to beat back unionization efforts." Enersys had hired a national law firm, Jackson Lewis, which describes itself as "committed to the practice of preventive labor relations." Just one of the firm's apparent tactics: an anti-union maintenance man, Tom Brown, testified that "a mysterious consultant known as Mr. X had advised him on how to oust the union and had helped him write fliers that called the union's leaders names like 'trailer trash,' 'Uncle Tom' and 'dog woman.'"
posted by T. Scott Brineman at 9:37 AM
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