IS 40 PERCENT OFFICIAL TIME ENOUGH FOR UNION PRESIDENTS?

Source: Fednews-online

The Federal Service Impasses Panel recently ruled that a union president can have 50 percent of his official time to perform his representational duties.

In Department of Veterans Affairs, Veteran Health Administration, Health Revenue Center, Topeka, Kansas and Local 906, American Federation of Government Employees, AFL-CIO, the VA filed a request for assistance with the FSIP to consider a negotiation impasse under the Federal Labor-Management Relations Statute between it and Local 906.

The Panel determined the parties should resolve the dispute through an informal teleconference with Panel Member Richard B. Ainsworth. The parties were informed that if a settlement was not reached that the Panel would be notified of the status of the dispute, including the parties’ final offers and Member Ainsworth’s recommendations, and the Panel would later resolve the dispute.

The parties were unable to settle. The VA believed the Local president’s time allocated for union representation should remain at 40 percent. The VA stated it is open to make accommodations to the Union president if 40 percent is not sufficient, but only in limited situations.

The union believed the representation time should be increased to 50 percent because the size of the bargaining unit had more than doubled in the past year and is expected to continue to grow based on the VA’s plans to hire and train more employees in the near future.

The Panel examined the evidence and ordered that the parties adopt the union’s position, which allows the union president to work 50 percent official time on representational duties.