AFL-CIO Applauds Bill That Will “Right a Wrong Done to Millions of Americans”
AFL-CIO President John Sweeney today joined America’s workers in applauding the introduction of legislation that would reverse a Republican-controlled National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) decision which opened the door for employers to strip workers in every profession of their union protections.
The bill, dubbed the Re-Empowerment of Skilled and Professional Employees and Construction Tradeworkers (RESPECT) Act, will overturn a September 2006 NLRB ruling that slashed longstanding labor law protections of workers’ freedom to form unions. The bill was introduced late yesterday by Reps. Robert Andrews (D-NJ) and Don Young (R-Alaska) in the House and Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-CT) in the Senate.
“The RESPECT Act will right a wrong done to millions of Americans when the Bush-dominated labor board stripped away their right to bargain for better wages and benefits,” Sweeney said.
The rulings came in three cases, collectively known as the Oakwood cases after the lead case, Oakwood Healthcare Inc., which radically reinterpreted the definition of “supervisor” in a way that greatly expanded the number and types of workers that can be classified as supervisors. The board ruled a worker can be classified as a supervisor if he or she spends as little as 10 percent to 15 percent of his or her time overseeing the work of others. That breaks down to less than an hour a day or one full shift every two weeks. Supervisors do not have protected rights under the National Labor Relations Act to improve their lives by forming and joining unions.
In their dissent, NLRB members Wilma Liebman and Dennis Walsh wrote that most professionals and other workers could fall under the new definition of supervisor, “who by 2012 could number almost 34 million, accounting for 23.3 percent of the workforce.” They went on to say the Republican majority did not follow what Congress intended in applying the National Labor Relations Act.
“The NLRB defied congressional intent by reclassifying as ‘supervisors’ many workers with only low-level supervisory duties, professionals such as nurses, and other skilled craftsperson,” Sweeney said. “The RESPECT Act will restore Congress’s original intent, which was never to deny protection to these workers.”
The bipartisan legislation also could help break a procedural logjam that is denying workers the right to join a union. Currently, the NLRB is holding up dozens of cases that address the definition of supervisor, and 60 of those are union election cases.
These cases have been sent back to the various regional boards. In some of these cases, workers who voted several years ago to form a union still are waiting for their ballots to be counted.
Contact: Steve Smith 202-637-5018
