(The following article by Mark Gruenberg was circulated by Press Associates Union News Service on January 14.)
WASHINGTON –As far as Jeff Bainter is concerned, George W. Bush is taxing railroad workers. But it’s really a lot more than that. He’s depriving them of job protections, too.
And it’s all thanks to the National Mediation Board, a labor relations agency whose members are named by Bush. It imposed filing fees for grievances on rail workers, but not railroads.
Bainter, President of Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees/Teamsters Local 1362 in Muncie, Ind., was one of almost 100 unionists marching in front of the building where the NMB met on a chilly D.C. morning on Jan.11.
“In practical terms, this is a tax upon the workers and a tax break for the employers,” Bainter says of the fees–up to $300 per grievance–that his union and other rail unions would have to pay. “They (railroads) break agreements every day.”
The protesters, all members of railroad unions, blasted NMB’s decision, issued later over union protests, to impose the fees on rail unions whenever they want to take grievances against the rail lines to that federal board. The railroads would not have to pay any fees. Until the Jan. 11 NMB decision, neither side had to pay any filing fees. Under a 1925 federal law unique to rail and airline unions, when the two sides have grievances and can’t reach agreement, they submit them to NMB arbitration. That law also severely curbs the unions’ right to strike.
But the fees themselves are only part of the problem, said Bainter, who is also Indiana state legislative director for BMWE. What the real problem is is that workers who are hurt on the job –financially, physically or otherwise–may lose their rights.
“I work on the tracks all day and I write grievances at night” for his local and his region, without pay, Bainter adds. Some of those claims may now be dropped because taking them to NMB would cost more than the grievances are worth.
“A typical claim might be for the railroad’s failure to pay a man a higher rate, out of his class, for taking on another assignment for a week. It might cost him eighty bucks, or $16 each workday. But it would cost us$300 to file a claim.
“I’d probably have to stop writing many claims,” because of the costs, thus depriving workers of possible aid, adds Bainter, who says he writes approximately 100 a year.
“Many of them are for safety and health issues, such as the ‘camp cars’ the railroads use to house workers in conditions like those of the 1800s, or forcing them to use outdoor port-a-johns in 30-degree weather,” he added.
Until now, Bainter and other local leaders, such as Sean Gerie of BMWE Local 2910 in Jim Thorpe, Pa., could take those claims to the NMB at no charge, forcing the railroads to respond. Now they can’t.
“This system isn’t perfect, but now they want to alter it because they want to plow over workers’ rights,” Gerie said, referring to both Bush and the railroads. “Before the ink’s dry on any of our contracts, the(railroads’) corporate lawyers are looking for loopholes.
“It’s about the workers whose rights are being trampled on by this administration,” adds Gerie, who says he handles grievances involving unjust firings, health and safety issues, and failure to pay required overtime, among other causes.
“This was a system that was negotiated and agreed upon for 75 years, and now they’re trying to change it arbitrarily and without our input, to payback their buddies in the big railroad companies as a political favor,” he stated.
But despite the marchers and the protests, the NMB had the last word, for now. It voted to approve the fees.
That didn’t stop one union president at the rally. He vowed that rail unions would take the agency to court.