NLRB extends labor agreement to outside temps. (On labor relations).(National Labor Relations Board)(Brief Article)

Last year, the National Labor Relations Board, the federal agency charged with enforcing federal laws regarding collective bargaining, ruled that temporary employees obtained through temporary help agencies and other staffing services could be combined with regular employees in collective bargaining units under the National Labor Relations Act.

On Oct. 1, the NLRB took the principle to startling new lengths, holding that an employer violated the act when it failed to apply the provisions of its existing collective bargaining agreement to such outside temporary-help employees.

This decision, rendered by a partial board in a 2-to-1 vote, bodes ill for all unionized employers, and should be anticipated and addressed at the bargaining table where that is feasible.

In the case, the employer, an Albany, NY-based wholesale …