Rand Paul throws his hat in the ring for a crucial committee position:
The midterm elections could bring big changes for labor law, including the likely passage of the Faster Labor Contracts Act. It’s been about a year since Sen. Josh Hawley welcomed his unlikely BFF, Teamsters President Sean O’Brien, for testimony about that legislation in front of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee. Yet Hawley might not be his party’s leader on that same committee next year.
Sen. Rand Paul announced that he’s seeking to become the HELP Committee’s Ranking Member, a spot currently occupied by Sen. Bernie Sanders, but next year, this position would go to a GOP member.
If successful, Paul would lead the GOP’s side of the committee, and he’s got support where it matters. Institute for the American Worker President Vincent Vernuccio declared, “We look forward to Senator Paul’s leadership and principled stand against Senator Bernie Sanders’ forced-unionism agenda.” Likewise, the Coalition for a Democratic Workplace (CDW) emphasized that Paul has never supported the Faster Labor Contracts Act or the PRO Act. CDW added, “We expect he’ll be a strong advocate for pro-worker legislation and commonsense labor policy.”
Additionally, Paul is the lead sponsor of the Senate’s version of the National Right to Work Act, and he’s authored dozens of other bills relating to labor, education, and healthcare.
A new twist in the ongoing Harvard strike:
We recently discussed the increasingly messy strike being waged by the Harvard Graduate Students Union-United Auto Workers (HGSU-UAW). Thousands of workers, including teaching fellows, are in their second week on strike. Last weekend, after the union asked Stephen Colbert not to cross the picket line, Colbert was evacuated from an event after someone pulled a fire alarm. HGSU-UAW stated that it has “no knowledge of its cause.”
The strike support among Harvard teaching fellows isn’t unanimous. In the Harvard Crimson, opinion writer (and teaching fellow) C.J. Passarella penned a column titled, “A Paid Strike Is Unserious.” Within this column, Passarella wrote of monitoring the strike “closely” and stated, “What I have seen has led me to doubt the integrity of the strike entirely.”
According to Passarella, “I was alarmed to learn that some HGSU members are encouraging striking workers to not report hours not worked to the University — and to thereby continue collecting their pay.” Not great!
Passarella added that “some of the fault lies with Harvard for implementing a payroll procedure that puts the onus on striking workers to report that they are indeed on strike. Such a system rewards nonaction on the part of striking workers.” Still, it’s not a good look for the union.
A nurse takes aim at blocking charges during her long decertification quest:
Six months ago, Spectrum Health Systems nurse Julie Reno filed a decertification petition to remove the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME). A vote hasn’t happened yet for the unit of 50 workers, and the union’s digging in its heels to stick around.
First, AFSCME invoked the contract bar, but Reno and her employer both argued that the union never produced a contract with the necessary effective and termination dates. Then the union filed two ULPs as blocking charges, and a regional director (RD) blocked the election in early October. Reno is now receiving legal assistance from the National Right to Work Foundation (NRTW Foundation) while arguing that the RD skipped a necessary hearing on the matter.
Ultimately, Reno argues that this case can be a vehicle for revisiting the blocking charge policy itself and cites NLRA Section 9(c), which mandates that the NLRB “shall direct an election.” Reno further points toward Board Member Scott Mayer’s Everon, LLC concurrence, in which Mayer criticized a blocking letter for neglecting to explain which ULP allegations support blocking a decertification vote. Mayer also stated, “I would be willing to reconsider this issue in a future appropriate case.” Reno hopes that her case will provide that opportunity.
A strike averted at Brigham and Women’s Hospital:
In early July, around 4,000 Brigham nurses went on a one-day strike that turned into a weeklong lockout, and two weeks ago, the Massachusetts Nurses Association (MNA) postponed an open-ended strike after the nurses rejected their employer’s “last, best, and final” offer. This week, as of Wednesday evening, the strike was officially called off. The nurses still must ratify the two-year contract, which includes a $1,000 ratification bonus for nurses below top scale.
This week, the hospital announced that the tentative agreement was “reached within the financial limits of the hospital’s last, best and final offer presented on Oct. 10.” Previously, the hospital said that the offer gave top-scale nurses a new 2.5% raise each year and kept the existing 5% annual increases for nurses still on the 20-step scale. On Oct. 8, the Boston Globe reported that the union had “significantly reduced their wage proposal” from what they originally asked when this dispute began.
How long can the BP Whiting refinery lockout last?
Since Mar. 19, BP has kept about 800 United Steelworkers (USW) members locked out of its Whiting, Ind. refinery. This followed the workers rejecting the company’s final offer, and since that time, the company has kept operations going with supervisors, replacement workers, and contractors at the refinery that supplies about a quarter of Midwest fuel.
BP says it must have a ratified agreement in hand before allowing the workers to return, and the company also wants a longer notice period going forward before another strike, rather than the current policy providing for only a few hours of notice. In late October, the local Fox affiliate reported that locked-out workers have grown weary and are ready for an end to the conflict, but no new bargaining dates have been scheduled.
This isn’t the longest refinery lockout, though. In 2021, Exxon kept union members locked out for 10 months in Beaumont, Texas.
