We better keep out eyes open , the NLRB is looking at passing new rules for all businesses.

The NLRB just announced a proposed rule requiring businesses to post notices in break rooms to inform employees of their rights to to bargain collectively, distribute union literature or engage in other union activities without reprisal. The NLRB issued a statement saying: “The intended effects of this action are to increase knowledge of the NLRA among employees, to better enable the exercise of rights under the statute, and to promote statutory compliance by employers and unions.” The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking will be published in the Federal Register tomorrow, and members of the public can submit comments on the proposal for 60 days, until February 22, 2011.

Labor Relations Institute will keep us all up to date on what is going on with this new rule.

Link To Story.

What will the Union Bosses tell their members ? How did they waste $90 Million of the members hard earned dues ?

Pat Cleary writing for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce sums up Big Labor’s political predicament nicely:

“Imagine waking up today as a union leader, having just burned $90 million of your members’ money, and having to tell them that you came up empty-handed. Oops!

Well, that’s the situation in which unions find themselves today. Figure AFSCME spent about $90 million of their members’ hard-earned dues to support candidates that a whole bunch of the members don’t support. The National Education Association took a break from thwarting education reform to pour $40 million of their members’ money down the same rat hole. Not to be outdone, the SEIU burned $44 million or so, too. Nice.

But worse yet for labor, 41 anti-democracy candidates who had voted for, cosponsored or endorsed the “Card Check” bill were defeated

What is Big Labor’s spin on the election results? One favorite Obama phrase we’re not likely to hear from them is “elections have consequences”.

Read the rest of this article            Link To Story.

The Labor Relations Institute is the place for information on this article and many more union facts and stories. Please visit their site. www.LRIonline.com

  We found another article on how the GOP is looking at right-to-work laws . Some states are looking at rewriting laws so workers would no longer be required to pay union dues to hold a job.

Governor-elect Scott Walker, a Republican who has supported this so-called right-to-work legislation in the past, neither embraced nor rejected the proposal Wednesday. But comments from Walker’s camp and other Republicans showed the challenges that could lie ahead for unions as Walker and the incoming GOP-led Legislature seek to give more flexibility to public and private employers looking to cut their labor costs.

Please read this article

By Jason Stein and Lee Bergquist of the Journal Sentinel

We recently came across this article talking about how the Obama Administration and the GSA are working to support the PLA’s. The Daily Caller had this to say.

This week, nineteen GOP members of Congress, including the incoming House Oversight and Government Reform Committee chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), sent a letter to GSA officials, asking why the agency is giving special treatment to Big Labor on federal construction projects exceeding $25 million in total cost.

According to the enclosed April 30, 2010, memo from the GSA’s Public Building Service (Instructional Bulletin 10-4), the GSA has changed its procurement policy to encourage the use of PLAs on all GSA construction projects exceeding $25 million. It appears this change gives contractors who agree to execute PLAs an unfair advantage when competing against qualified contractors unwilling to use PLAs.  We are concerned that this violates the longstanding competitive bidding principles governing federal procurement.

  The GSA’s PLA preference is problematic.  As members of Congress we have heard numerous complaints from the construction community that PLAs discourage competition from qualified contractors and their skilled employees, including small and minority and women-owned businesses.  PLAs serve as a barrier to new jobs for more than 85 percent of the U.S. construction workforce—those who have decided not to join a labor union—and several studies found that PLAs increase the cost of construction by as much as 18 percent.e GSA’s PLA preference is problematic.  As members of Congress we have heard numerous complaints from the construction community that PLAs discourage competition from qualified contractors and their skilled employees, including small and minority and women-owned businesses.  PLAs serve as a barrier to new jobs for more than 85 percent of the U.S. construction workforce—those who have decided not to join a labor union—and several studies found that PLAs increase the cost of construction by as much as 18 percent.                                     Please read the entire article

 Here we go again….With more Americans waking up to the fact that unions are not really necessary in todays world the union has asked bureaucrats to give them MORE help to stay alive in our struggling country and with this poor economy. Please read what Christopher Prandoni  has written about who is behind pushing for more power for the Big Unions.

After Consistently Losing Elections, Unions Ask Feds for Help              

by Christopher Prandoni  

We recently came across a company that was under attack by the road fitters union 669. As you will read in the article, this can happen to any company out there. Now more than ever since the Government is supporting the unions we all need to pay attention !

By: Gary D. Turner, CEO of Urban Fire Protection, Royce City, Texas
  It began on May 27, 2010 with the Road Fitters Local Union 669 enticing a few employees to sign petition cards which would force the company to hold an election in an attempt to require our company’s field labor to be represented by a collective bargaining agreement. As we pay more than fair wages based on skill and self-improvement, we offer an excellent medical plan and we offer a generous 401K plan and, in some cases, a company vehicle,
we knew we were a union targeted company. The benefits our employees currently enjoy far outweighed the promised jobs at a union company.

A hearing was held by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to determine who would be eligible to vote in the election. We argued that since we intermingle employees of both Royse City and Houston on many of the same projects, the Houston employees should be allowed to vote. The NLRB determined that only our Royse City employees could vote.The Union maneuvered to put off the election by filing an Unfair Labor Practice Charge, making seven (7) different claims, including a claim that an employee who was discharged was fired for his Union sympathies, even though he had tested positive on a drug test! The waiting for the vote was totally distracting, and production in the field was at its worst. Even the Houston office employees were impacted by the waiting because it could affect how they would interact on projects with the Royse City employees. After suffering through a day-long interview in our offices by the NLRB, that agency finally dismissed all the charges on September 23, 2010 and the election was rescheduled for October 13, 2010.

When the employees finally got a right to vote, they made their intention clear by voting against the Union by a 78 percent majority. We thank our employees for their loyalty. We write this as a warning to other small contractors to be prepared. Never think you are too insignificant to be a Union target.

If you are a small business owner or contractor please pay attention and help us get the word out to the rest of Americans!!! If we all work together we can keep our work choices Free.

Recently the AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler explained to telephone press conference listeners,

I strongly believe the young worker outreach is the key to labor’s potential and we have to be creative and deliberate. With the economy being what it is, young workers feel disenfranchised and it’s up to us to take on this work and move it forward.

 This announcement was the groundwork for plans to announced it plans to step up the AFL-CIO efforts to reach young people, so that they “know the value of collective action and be connected with unions.”

Teaming up with the American Federation of Teachers, the AFL-CIO aims at interjecting more union propaganda in America’s school systems. The result of a youth summit held this past summer lead to the establishment of 10 initiatives designed to coax more young workers into the AFL-CIO/Big Labor fold.

What are your children being taught at school?

Well November had you thinking about elections, and now that the dust has settled there are some things that are under the dust that are coming to light.

It is time to start thinking about the policies that are on the plate of the new Congress and Senate.  An interesting twist that will effect the direction of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) is the recent closing of coments by the Federal Accounting Standards Board (FASB) on the accounting of liabilities as it relates to pension funds.

A  Washington Examiner columnist Mark Hemingway explains:

“Under “last man standing” accounting rules, if five companies are in a plan and four go bankrupt, the fifth company is responsible for meeting the pension obligations for the employees of the other four companies.

What this means is that companies with union labor often have pension liabilities that are several multiples higher than the pension expenditures they report — the Kroger grocery store chain shocked analysts last year when it disclosed its multiemployer pension liabilities more than doubled in a year to $1.2 billion.

Ratings agencies such as Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s have been highlighting the lack of transparency in union pension plans. Now Wall Street wants union businesses to be upfront about their liabilities.

FASB’s new rule could effectively wipe out the paper worth of many companies, especially in the trucking and construction industries. Once banks and creditors are aware of these staggering pension liabilities, it will make it nearly impossible for union businesses to get loans, credit lines or bonding.

If forced to report their true liabilities, hundreds — perhaps thousands — of companies will scramble to get out from under their union obligations.”

This may not seem like it has anything to do with EFCA, but wait a minute and think about how one of the largest sources of revenue could suddenly dissappear.  This could take shape in a last ditch effort to push the Employee Free Choice Act, and a taxpayer-funded bailout of these defunct pension plans.

This is really a time to reflect on what buttons will be pushed and the results of those moves.  Understanding the move of the FASB to unearth the real debts of union shops is just the first step that may box in the Democratic party into pushin for the EFCA once again. 

Make no mistake, Big Labor will find a way to use this law as additional leverage against American businesses. Write your senator TODAY to oppose the act.

Why?  Here are four reasons from  Labor Relations Institute, Inc:

more governmental interference in business

revealing more competitive data to the government (payscales, etc)

cost of having to comply with prying agencies wanting data

unions eventual use of the law in corporate campaigns and organizing drives

It all started as a an act for pay equality for women and turned into the Paycheck Fariness Act (S.3772).

If enacted, the legislation would:

• Make compensatory and punitive damages available as remedies in Equal Pay Act cases.
• Authorize class actions governed by the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.
• Mandate training and other outreach efforts by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Labor Department’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs on wage discrimination issues.

Sounds good right?

From the business perspective it is opening up a can of worms that will quickly turn to a nightmare in reporting.  It is hard enough to stay competitive, opening up sensitive data will only make this challenge greater, and to what end?  The proposed bill is not really on target with helping women gain equal wages, this is not the direction or approach that should be taken in order to make that happen.

There are better ways, so write your Senator today and make this act dissappear from the agenda!

Labor law has undergone some very scary transformations in the past few months, and there is one law firm that is breaking grounds in delivering the message that everyone needs to hear.

Even with the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) now seemingly DOA, major reform of labor law is not far off. Wilma Liebman and the three new Obama appointees, including Craig Becker, are now in the driver’s seat at the National Labor Relations Board. Big Labor justifiably expects the Liebman/Becker-led Board to deliver on Obama’s campaign promises and to revamp federal labor law in its favor.

Christina Kotowski and Mark Ross of Fisher & Phillips, LLC have taken the issues of labor reform and they laid out the direction that the current administration is headed down.

As part of its reform of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), the Board will likely institute administrative rulemaking before the end of 2011. The new legislative rules that emerge from this rarely-used process will have the full force and effect of law and will create a new playing field that is heavily tilted in favor of union organizing and union bargaining rights.

Please notice that this has been pushed through using a “rarely-used process” and that this new field is a way to get legislation passed through a back door, giving the union unpresidented bargaining rights.

The NLRA is no exception. Section 6 of the Act specifically grants the Board authority to promulgate “such rules and regulations as may be necessary to carry out the provisions of this Act.” Despite this broad authority, the Board has generally avoided the rulemaking process. Instead, it chooses to announce its labor policies and rules of general applicability in the decisions generated by hearings on election petitions and unfair labor practice charges.

Look at this section closely, there is a provision that not only lets this board set up authority to write the rules they can also carry out the provisions to enforce the rules.  That is a lot of power for a board to have!

It is akin to having the police, judge, and executioner being one and the same, with no checks to ensure the right things are being done.

Unions and many commentators favor this “vote first, then litigate” approach, believing that this one procedural change alone will dramatically alter the R‑case playing field and substantially improve a union’s chances of successful organizing. It would also require employers to be far more anticipatory and proactive in response to possible organizing.

Imagine a world where they believe you guilty, throw you in jail, then decide to ask questions.  Thatis what we have here, litigation is never the place that rules and regulations should be sorted out. 

In the end, we recommend that you read this article, yes, it is long, but it is full of information about what is currently going on and well worth the time it takes to read.