House Approves Employee Free Choice Bill

The House of Representatives voted 241-185 in favor of legislation that would strengthen workers’ ability to bargain for better wages, benefits, and working conditions by safeguarding their rights when they choose to form unions. 

Rep. George Miller (D-CA), chairman of the House Education & Labor Committee and a co-sponsor of the bill, said the Employee Free Choice Act (H.R. 800) would reform a broken system in which “employers frequently intimidate, harass, reassign or even fire workers who support the formation of a union.”

APWU President William Burrus praised the March 1 vote, and thanked union members for their efforts in securing its approval in the House.

“A long-term campaign will be required to turn this bill into law,” he said, noting that Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has pledged to block the bill in the Senate and the White House has threatened to veto the bill if it reaches the president’s desk.

“I encourage APWU members to contact their senators and urge them to support this important legislation,” Burrus said. 

“USPS employees enjoy a great sense of security because of the union’s role in the workplace,” he said. “We must help extend those protections to our brothers and sisters in the private sector if we want to improve conditions for our families and friends and for our nation’s middle-class.”

The Employee Free Choice Act would recognize workers’ freedom to form unions when a majority of employees sign forms designating the union as their bargaining representative. This “card-check” process is permitted under current law, but only if the employer agrees.

Most employers force workers to undergo an election administered by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), “where the deck is stacked heavily against pro-union workers,” Miller said. 

The bill also would stiffen penalties against employers that illegally fire or discriminate against workers who engage in union organizing activities and would allow employers and newly formed unions to refer bargaining to mediation and arbitration if they are unable to agree on a first contract after 90 days of bargaining.

The union has witnessed first-hand the difficulties private-sector workers face under current law, Burrus said, citing an APWU organizing campaign at a private-sector mail processing plant operated by DHL Express in Wilmington OH. The NLRB issued a complaint against the global delivery company in January, charging the company with “interfering with, restraining, and coercing employees” who were seeking to unionize. 

“Giving workers the ability to bargain for better wages and benefits is a key part of strengthening America’s middle class,” Miller said in a statement following the vote. “Union workers earn 30 percent more, on average, than do non-union workers, and union workers are much more likely to have healthcare, pensions, and more generous paid time off.”