| FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE August 23, 2000 |
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Wal-Mart Busted for Bad Faith with Workers Bentonville Bureaucrats Betray Sam Walton's Legacy Of Commitment To Associates Wal-Mart---the nation's largest employer and the world's largest retailer--- has been busted for refusing to recognize the freely chosen representative of meat department workers in Jacksonville, Texas, and for refusing to bargain in good faith with those workers as required under law. "The Bentonville bureaucrats have betrayed the legacy of Sam Walton. Sam had a vision of a company where workers are respected and their voices are heard. Now, the Bentonville numbers crunchers and their lawyers are waging war against Wal-Mart workers. They cover their ears and close their eyes when it comes to worker concerns. Wal-Mart workers are coming together through their union to keep the legacy of Sam Walton alive, and to make their voices heard," said Mike Leonard, International Vice President and Director of Strategic Programs for the United Food And Commercial Workers Union (UFCW), the union representing Wal-Mart workers. According to a complaint issued on August 22, 2000, the General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is seeking a legal order directing Wal-Mart to comply with federal law, and to recognize the workers' union and bargain in good faith. Wal-Mart management had refused a request from the workers' union to begin negotiations. The complaint was issued only a day after the UFCW filed charges with the NLRB. The swift NLRB action follows consistent rulings by the labor board rejecting Wal-Mart's repeated efforts to delay and deny the exercise of workers' legal rights. Under federal law, workers have the absolute right to have a voice in the workplace, and employers have an absolute obligation to respect that right and to bargain in good faith with workers over workplace issues. In four separate rulings over the past several months, the NLRB has rejected Wal-Mart's attempts to twist the law and pervert the legal process in the company's campaign to suppress workers. Wal-Mart tried first to keep the workers from having a union representation election and then tried to overturn the result of the government-supervised, secret ballot election when the workers voted for a union. Despite Wal-Mart's public relations huffing and puffing about its legal claims, the NLRB has always ruled against Wal-Mart and in favor of workers. Meat department workers cheered the labor board's ruling, and are compiling negotiations surveys to determine the most important issues to present to the company at the bargaining table. Low wages, high cost health insurance and scheduling top the bargaining agenda----but, respect and fair treatment are the key issues of concern to workers. Wal-Mart's anti-union barrage of threats and promises has not weakened the resolve of the Jacksonville workers. "We won the first union election at Wal- Mart, we had the first union steward at Wal-Mart, and we will have the first union contract at Wal-Mart," said Joe Hendricks, meat department worker and UFCW union steward, Jacksonville, Texas Wal-Mart Supercenter. |
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