Workforce Democracy and Fairness Act

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. BUCSHON. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in strong support of the Workforce Democracy and Fairness Act.

In the last few years, the National Labor Relations Board has had a clear bias toward Big Labor in decisions and rulemaking. Although this bill addresses several onerous rules and decisions from the NLRB, I would like to focus on one in particular.

On August 26 of this year, the Board overturned decades--let me repeat--decades of precedent with its decision in the Specialty Healthcare case. By standing up today and voting for the bill before us, we can stop an out-of-control agency from causing irreparable harm to industries across the Nation. The Board has decided it will no longer determine if the interests of a bargaining unit are sufficiently different from other current units. This will encourage unions to create the smallest so-called ``micro-unions'' possible, and it could result in employers having to negotiate with multiple units within their own businesses. This undermines a worker's ability to make an informed choice about whether to join a union, and it may potentially fractionate the workplace.

H.R. 3094 reinstates the traditional standard for determining which employees make up an appropriate bargaining unit. This bill is about fairness for workers and employers. It returns the Board to the precedent that it has operated under for the last 20 to 30 years under both Republican and Democratic administrations. Returning to this precedent will provide certainty and clarity to workers and employers, and it will undo the biased behavior of the current Board.

I support this bill, and I urge my colleagues to do the same.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source