Tagged as DOL

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Economic Justice, Press Releases, UFCW Values

FOOD AND COMMERCIAL WORKERS URGE CONFIRMATION OF SECRETARY DESIGNATE HILDA SOLIS

Feb 09, 2009

 

Sign the Petition

(Washington, DC)  — The United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW), America’s neighborhood union, calls for the immediate confirmation of Labor Secretary nominee Hilda Solis.  Secretary Designate Solis has been a loyal champion for working Americans, fighting for workers’ rights and safety. UFCW members know that she will be an excellent Secretary of Labor, and are frustrated that Republican Senators are obstructing her confirmation during this economic crisis.  While thousands of people are forced onto unemployment, our nation needs to have a Labor Secretary to immediately help solve our jobs crisis.

Why are Republican Senators delaying this important confirmation? Solis has a stellar track record on labor issues.  Her own background as the daughter of a union shop steward from Mexico and an assembly line worker from Nicaragua has led her to stand up and speak out for working families. And the confirmation of the first Latina Secretary of Labor, showcasing the growing diversity in our country, should be a matter of pride for the U.S.

It is clear that those Republican Senators who seek to thwart her confirmation would like to prevent the Department of Labor from fulfilling its function: in the words of the DOL’s mission statement, by fostering and promoting “the welfare of the job seekers, wage earners, and retirees of the United States.”

Secretary Designate Solis’ expertise with labor issues, her experience as a federally-elected official and her longtime role as a champion of workers are reason enough for confirmation.  She is eminently qualified, and Republican Senators should stop obstructing her confirmation.

Press Releases, Retail, Social Justice, UFCW Industries, Walmart

Millions of Workers Being Denied Billions in Hard-Earned Wages

Nov 13, 2008

WASHINGTON, DC – “”American businesses are bilking millions of working Americans out of billions in wages every year,”" said Michael J. Wilson, International Vice President and Director of Legislative and Political Action at the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, who appeared at the Department of Labor early this afternoon to discuss wage theft. Conservative estimates place the sum of illegally withheld wages at $20 billion. Millions of Americans are denied overtime, forced to work off the clock, and unjustly docked pay. American workers reasonably expect that the laws governing wages passed by the United States Congress and state legislatures will be respected by their employers. They expect that they shouldn’t have to go to court to collect the paychecks they’ve earned.

Recent history is filled with examples of systematic circumvention of wage and hour law by some of America’s biggest companies:

• The world’s single largest employer, Wal-Mart, faced nearly sixty lawsuits for violating wage and hour regulations in 2006 alone. Among numerous other breaches of state and federal law, Wal-Mart has docked workers’ pay for eating lunch, forced employees to stay at work off the clock, and denied overtime pay to individuals working full shifts seven days a week.

• Agriprocessors, Inc., one of the largest kosher meatpacking plants in the country, illegally charged more than 2,000 workers for required uniforms and safety gear, and withheld final paychecks from dozens of employees.

• Michael Bianco, Inc., a company with significant military contracts, docked workers 15 minutes worth of pay for being just one minute late, docked workers $20 of pay for being in the restroom for longer than two minutes, and required workers to work two consecutive shifts without overtime pay.

“”We’re not talking about mom-and-pop shops forgetting a nickel here and a dime there; some of the nation’s biggest companies have been systematically denying employees their hard-earned wages,”" said Wilson. “”Workers should reasonably be able expect that they won’t need to go to court to collect the paychecks they’ve earned.”"

Press Releases, UFCW Values, Workplace Safety & Health

Federal Judge Orders Labor Department to Answer for Eight-Year Delay in Requiring Employers to Pay for Safety Equipment

Feb 21, 2007

A United States Court of Appeals ordered the Department of Labor (DOL) to respond in 30 days to a suit requesting the court to order OSHA to implement a long-delayed standard that would require employers to pay the costs of protective clothing, lifelines, face shields, gloves and other equipment used by an estimated 20 million workers to protect them from job hazards.

The United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) and the AFL-CIO sued the DOL January 3 over an eight-year delay in implementing an Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) rule requiring employers to pay for personal protective equipment (PPE).

The lawsuit asserts that the Bush Administration’s failure to act is putting workers in danger.  By OSHA’s own estimates, 400,000 workers have been injured and 50 have died due to the absence of this rule.  The labor groups noted that workers in some of America’s most dangerous industries, such as meatpacking, poultry and construction, and low-wage and immigrant workers who suffer high injury rates, are vulnerable to being forced by their employers to pay for their own safety gear because of OSHA’s failure to finish the PPE rule.

The rule was first announced in 1997 and proposed in 1999 by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) after a ruling by the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission that OSHA’s existing PPE standard could not be interpreted to require employers to pay for protective equipment.  The new rule would not impose any new obligations on employers to provide safety equipment; it simply codifies OSHA’s longstanding policy that employers, not employees, have the responsibility to pay for it.

In 1999, OSHA promised to issue the final PPE rule in July 2000.  But it missed that deadline and has missed every self-imposed deadline since.  The agency failed to act in response to a 2003 petition by the AFL-CIO and UFCW and  requests by the Hispanic Congressional Caucus.  The lawsuit seeking to end this eight-year delay, called it “egregious.”

The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, asked the court to issue an order directing the Secretary of Labor to complete the PPE rule within 60 days of the court’s order.