Organizing and Elections in Unions Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Organizing and Elections in Unions - Essay Example This study mainly intends to reveal two real life occurrences in which two firms provided real time hurdles to the employees related to their joining unions; however, despite of ULP’s protest against the firms, it proved to be of no use. SOME OF THE INSTANCES WHERE ULP’S CHARGES WERE OF LITTLE OR NO USE The top retail chain in the world i.e. Wal-Mart suffered negativity as the regional National Labour Relations Board (NLRB) directors issued as sum total of thirty-nine complaints against the company during the periods of January 2000 to July 2005. The most disturbing fact was observed to be that out of the thirty nine complaints, thirteen complaints were totally resolved by way of various settlements outside the Court of Justice, two cases are still pending for settlement and four of them were withdrawn. The remaining twenty cases were heard by the US Labour Law. However, while settling thirteen of the complaints, the company complied with all the necessary changes that needed to take place for restraining itself from practicing Unfair Labor Practices but did not hold itself in guilt for restricting its employees from participating in trade unions. In all the cases, the company seemed to hold itself for violating the broad rules and regulations of NLRB. A majority of the cases that were filed against Wal-Mart constituted complaints from its employees. The company was continuously engaged in the violation of labour laws during the period of January 2000 to July 2005. It was also observed that the company had exercised upon many unfair law practices in the organization, violating legal obligations concerning complete rights to its employees such as right to freedom of association which is internationally considered to be allowed to workers1. The reports published in this context further revealed that since the year 2000, the company has been practicing discrimination against unions along with the sympathizers of the unions within its workforce on dif ferent occasions. The company officials were not only charged with the allegation of harassing junior employees on the grounds of race, ethnicity and gender. The company also took many extreme steps where it hired and fired employees in small frequencies without any firm cause which can be justified under the provisions of relevant Court of Law. The top most reason for firing of employees was further observed to be the willingness and efforts made by the employees to join associations or created unions. For instance, it was noted that in April 2000, in one of the stores of the company, which is located in Florida, Wal-Mart unlawfully fired a union supporter named Edward Eagen. The reason for firing him was only because of the fact that he signed a ‘union card’ for supporting unionism within the organization. It has also been noted that the company was engaged in keeping a close look at the employees with the help of surveillance cameras which hindered employee confident iality within the workplace. With reference to these facts, it can be stated that the rights of the employees were exploited at almost all levels by the company. Such interventions practiced by the company as against the rights and interests of employees also affected the company’