Restaurateurs and other small-business owners have had a tough enough go in this economy without having to deal with a new onslaught of unionization campaigns.
And hoping they won’t happen isn’t a substitute for strategy.
A series of recent rulings from the National Labor Relations Board suggests that you ignore union activity at your own peril as the regulatory battlefield tilts against the restaurant industry. You need to think and act preemptively against third-party intrusions into your business.
One longer-term proposed solution? The Hatch-Scott Employee Rights Act, or ERA.
The ERA pivots around the concept of redefining the union/union member relationship by creating new protections for individuals in the workplace at the expense of institutionalized international labor unions. Polling indicates the bill enjoys widespread support among union and nonunion households alike. But it needs the support of small businessmen if it’s going to succeed.
The ERA anticipated the NLRB’s efforts to impose so-called “quickie” elections by offering those who regret signing up a way out. Unions rightly assume that with less time, employers can’t effectively educate to offset a union stealth campaign. As it stands now, the median time between an election being called for and it being held is 38 days. Under proposed rules, unions could spend months organizing under the radar, while employers would have as few as 14 days to inform employees about the potential downsides of unionization.
We shouldn’t trust unions to inform their prospective members that last year there were 139 indictments of union officials for labor racketeering enforcement actions — not to mention $72.9 million in fines, restitutions, forfeitures and civil monetary actions. They’ll also probably gloss over the fact that unions faced a total of 6,367 allegations of violating labor law in 2009, and that nearly 90 percent of those allegations came from their own union members.
To ensure that those with buyer’s remorse are heard — and give voice to the nine out of 10 current union members who never voted for the union collecting their dues — the ERA would require recertification votes every three years. Polling from the Opinion Research Corporation demonstrates that 83 percent of union households support tri-yearly recertification votes, and 78 percent support federally supervised unionization elections in all cases.
Another popular provision of the ERA requires private, federally monitored unionization elections whenever a vote is called — 78 percent of union households support such a measure. This would put a stop to card-check elections, which are currently taking place after putting pressure on employers to allow them, and guarantee the rights of those who do not want to unionize but worry about intimidation from union bosses.
The ERA alone won’t be enough to protect restaurants from the threat of unions and their suffocating work rules. One new requirement from the NLRB says businesses must put up a new poster advising them of their right to unionize; another will allow for the formation of smaller bargaining units, or “micro unions.” One can imagine a situation in which restaurants are forced to operate like municipal governments, bargaining with multiple unions representing different groups of employees — one for cooks, another for bartenders, a third for waitstaff.
Given the new NLRB requirements, getting involved early is necessary. It’s time to inoculate your employees against the dangers of unions. Orientation packets filled with data from public resources like UnionFacts.com are a good start, but only a start.
Between earlier intervention and the Employee Rights Act, much work can be done to tamp down union activity. But it will require a proactive sense of leadership from an industry that has ignored this issue for far too long.
Richard Berman is president of Berman & Co., a Washington, D.C.-based lobbying firm.
The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of Nation's Restaurant News.
