Brent Heath: Faster Labor Contracts Act (FLCA) bill

By Brent Heath- NCGOP District Chairman 

Lenoir County currently has a 3.5% unemployment rate, and the median income is just over $45,000. Legislation is moving through Congress that would hand Washington bureaucrats sweeping new authority over workplace contracts in eastern North Carolina and across the nation. As a conservative, I see this as disastrous, but this bill should gravely concern you regardless of your political affiliation. It will empower union bosses and unaccountable government arbitrators at the expense of workers and businesses alike.

Under the Faster Labor Contracts Act (FLCA) bill, when workers vote to unionize, the new union and the employer have 100 days to negotiate a first contract. If negotiations fail, a federal mediator is appointed to resolve disagreements. If mediation fails, the dispute goes to a panel of three government-appointed arbitrators. 

Here is the concerning part: these government arbitrators would not be required to have any relevant industry experience. They also would not be liable if their decisions cost workers jobs. This alone should be enough for legislators to dismiss this bill. Unfortunately, the proposal has gained troubling momentum in recent weeks: Representative Don Davis (D-01-NC) signed a discharge petition that risks breathing new life into this ill-conceived legislation.

Additionally, the FLCA would empower a radical fringe in the labor movement, which is notorious for injecting far-left ideology into the bargaining process. There are several examples of unions turning contract negotiations into a vehicle for radical left politics. 

At Columbia University, the Student Workers union made demands so extreme that even its parent union, the United Auto Workers, urged them to reconsider. These demands included prohibiting Columbia from contacting the New York Police Department under any circumstances, requiring the university to dismantle
its security cameras, establishing an open campus where no one has to show identification, and even requiring Columbia to divest from Israel and end its academic partnerships with Israeli universities. Last year the Trader Joe's union formally demanded the company designate all its stores as sanctuary stores, while privately strategizing how to provoke the company into objecting so that the union could score political points with the public.

There is no shortage of these troubling examples, but the point is clear: labor unions all too often prioritize partisan politics ahead of the real needs of their workers. By instituting an arbitrary and unrealistically tight timeline, the FLCA would force arbitration early in the process. If that happens, radical ideology risks being imposed on workers and businesses alike without it ever being voted on.

Representative Davis has positioned himself as a moderate who puts North Carolina first. However, signing a discharge petition to force a vote on such radical legislation is not what a moderate prioritizing North Carolinians would do. It is the act of someone who has decided to prioritize union bosses in Washington over the workers and employers he was sent to represent. Partisan political agendas, from open borders to defunding the police, do not belong in labor contracts. To represent North Carolina first as he promised, Representative Davis should withdraw his support for this bill and clearly tell his constituents that he will vote against it when it reaches the floor.