Twitter
Facebook
Reddit
Digg
Tell us what you think!Send a letter to the editor about this or any other article in The Maine Campus.
Employers intimidating unions, the Employee Free Choice Act and secret-ballot worker elections were covered during an April 6 symposium.
The symposium included 13 speakers, including well-known author and activist Barbara Ehrenreich.
“All too often the law has turned against workers,” said William Murphy, director of the Bureau of Labor Education at the University of Maine.
According to the Bureau of Labor Education, the Employee Free Choice Act would allow places where the majority of workers who have signed union authorization cards to become certified as bargaining representatives. This is called a card-check process and represents the voluntary recognition of unions.
Since Congress recognized the Wagner Act in 1935, employees became legally protected to form unions. According to many of Monday’s speakers, employers use intimidation and fear to stop a union from forming.
The Employee Free Choice Act would ensure early bargaining on contracts, put an end to delays and employer intimidation tactics and strengthen the enforcement of worker’s rights, according to the speakers. Under the act, employers would face greater penalties for participating in unfair labor conditions when employees negotiate a first contract. Those penalties include back pay awarded to the employees discriminated against, and – in cases of multiple violations by employers – fines up to $20,000 for each violation.
Three workers, Linda Morris of the Red Cross, Marylee MacDonald of Eastern Maine Medical Center and Steve Husson of DHL, shared their union experiences.
“Immediately you have to start speaking [with the employer],” Husson said, who remembers the initial steps of forming a union at DHL Express, an international mailing company.
Morris, MacDonald and Husson told stories about employers’ intimidation tactics. Their testimonies described forced office meetings in which employers made employees speak with them one-on-one about their unions. Employers required employees to listen to an anti-union lawyer and read negative literature about their cause.
MacDonald remembered the forced separation between workers. Employers did not allow employees to take breaks alone. The word “union” was forbidden in the workplace.
According to Husson, DHL employees were required to hold a secret-ballot election. Seventy percent of employees signed authorization cards – the union won by a single vote on the ballot.
“The word ‘union’ equals fear,” Husson said.
According to EFCAexposed.com, a Web site created by the Labor Relations Institute, the Free Choice Act would end the secret-ballot practice that gives power to unions. Cynthia Phinney, a union boss for workers of Bangor Hydro and Central Maine Power, told Monday’s audience that this is false information. The act will not stop the secret ballot; the bill will make it impossible for employers to force a secret ballot on employees, even after the union has been achieved through a card check – similar to what happened during the organization of DHL’s union. If employees wish to vote on their union through a secret ballot, it will still be legal for them to do so.
“Workers have no rights because of the groups that are campaigning against EFCA,” Ehrenreich said.
Ehrenreich is the author of the book “Nickel and Dimed,” in which she accounts her experiences in blue-collar working conditions first-hand through investigative reporting.
Ehrenreich described blue-collar working conditions where there was little contact with co-workers and few bathroom breaks.
“You could be fired for just about anything,” Ehrenreich said. “We work at-will in America – The boss’s will.”
There was a question-and-answer session at the end of Ehrenreich’s presentation, during which she stressed that the first step in securing workers’ rights is passing the Employee Free Choice Act.
“Establish your rights with the strength that the union provides for you,” Ehreneich said, who believes the Employee Free Choice Act is a step away from totalitarianism and toward democracy.
Audience members were encouraged to contact Maine senators to show their approval of the Employee Free Choice Act.
One of the final speakers, Barbara Lambarida, director of the Maine State Nurses Union, left the audience with words of encouragement.
“The best part of being in a union is standing up with my coworkers, having a voice and not worrying about being fired,” Lambarida said.
Mario Moretto, co-chair of the Wildcat Student Labor Action Project encouraged students to get involved in the Free Choice Act movement by joining Wildcat SLAP, which works on both a community and national level to achieve worker justice. Wildcat SLAP meets every Tuesday at 6 p.m. in the Totman Room of the Memorial Union. Contact Moretto on FirstClass for more information.
Bangor Daily News