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NLRB Pushes Ahead on “Quickie Election” Rule

Posted by Attorney David McClurg in Labor Relations / Comments

The National Labor Relations Board ("NLRB") has announced that on November 30th it will conduct a public meeting at which it will vote whether to issue final rules regarding certain provisions of the so called "quickie election" procedures the NLRB proposed on June 22, 2011.  The specific provisions of the final rules are not yet known, but it seems likely that they will provide for significantly faster processing of union-filed petitions for elections, electronic voting procedures, and a requirement that employers provide a petitioning union with detailed contact information regarding employees in the proposed unit early in the process.

Member Brian Hayes, the Ione Republican on the NLRB, submitted a highly critical and unusual response to Congressman John Kline, Chairman of the Committee on Education and the Workforce, which has oversight responsibilities over the NLRB.  Member Hayes asserted, among other things, Chairman Mark Pearce and Member Craig Becker were improperly attempting to rush the rule to final issuance prior to the expiration of Member Becker’s recess appointed later this year, without regard to established NLRB practices and without affording member Hayes “the requisite opportunity to review and draft a dissent to the rule.”  The NLRB’s longstanding procedural traditions and internal operating rules cannot, said Member Hayes, “simply be cast aside in pursuit of a singular agenda without doing irreparable harm to the Board’s legitimacy.”

The outcome of the November 30th public meetingwill be of great interest to all employers.