NLRB to review two controversial Bush-era rulings

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.workdayminnesota.org/index.php?news_6_4616

12 September 2010
WASHINGTON - The National Labor Relations Board has voted 3-2 along party lines to review two controversial rulings from the era when it was run by appointees of GOP President George W. Bush.
One Bush-era ruling, the Dana decision, let workers who want to decertify the union challenge it up to 45 days after it won representation rights through majority sign-up, or “card check.” The other Bush-era decision opened the possibility that “successor” companies could challenge their obligation to bargain with unions.

The two Bush-era rulings, also by party-line votes, outraged unions, and contributed to independent raters of workers’ rights downgrading labor rights in the United States.

The difference in the two boards is that in 2007, the NLRB was run by a 3-man Republican majority – and its chair had been the lawyer for the Detroit newspapers in their bitter lockout of the workers. By contrast, the present board is chaired by Democrat Wilma Liebman, the only remaining board member from 2007, and includes two Obama administration-named members among its three-person Democratic majority.

Liebman defended the decision to review the Bush-era rulings, using new cases that have made their way to the board. At the time of the 2007 rulings, particularly the Dana decision that allowed quick decertification after card-check recognition, Liebman had written the prior ruling “cuts voluntary recognition off at the knees.”


FULL story at link.