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Washington, D.C.—The leader of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) said today she is disappointed but not surprised by the decision of the Department of Health and Human Service (HHS) to rescind a step taken 15 months ago that expanded the collective bargaining rights of agency employees.
At the same time, NTEU President Colleen M. Kelley said that, given HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson’s “track record with organized labor as governor of Wisconsin,” she remains hopeful of continued cooperation with management in the largest civilian government department.
In April, 2000, then-Secretary Donna Shalala issued a memorandum accepting the recommendation of the NTEU-HHS National Partnership Council that the parties deal in partnership over matters referred to in federal labor law as “permissive” subjects of bargaining.
Under the labor relations statute, these subjects, including the numbers, types and grades of employees and the technology, methods and means of performing work, are subject to bargaining only at the “election” of agency management. These are widely called “(b)(1)” matters to reflect that section of the law.
Kelley said the HHS decision “did not come as a surprise” in the wake of President Bush’s executive order of February 17 revoking the Clinton administration’s 1993 order establishing federal sector labor-management partnership. “The President has made it clear from the outset of his administration as to how little he values the role of federal unions in providing pre-decisional input and feedback to agency management,” she said.
At the same time, Kelley pointed both to Secretary Thompson’s “noteworthy” cooperation with unions during his tenure as Wisconsin’s governor and the language of an internal HHS (b)(1) memorandum issued this week.
Kelley said the HHS memorandum to the heads of the agency’s operating and staff divisions speaks of the department’s “strong history of cooperative labor-management relations” and the fact that union and management officials working together “have contributed greatly to the quality of employee work life and the achievement of our mission” –and it offers a stated goal of “a continued effort to enhance these relationships.”