My employer has recently been on what seems like an effort to break our Union membership. They are now isolating union members that stand up for themselves only when our union steward is unavailable for "meetings" on whatever issues they have. When our members ask to have their union rep present or even to have another union member for a witness as required by the contract they are simply stating no and threatening to file claims of insubordination when the member objects. They are also demanding to know what is said when they see any new employees talking with the senior members of our department what laws exist to protect our rights to representation in West Virginia has any law been violated here?

I am not a union member or really wild about them, but this is a bump for JoeC, since he is both and your question deserves an answer.

Oh very bad Ju-Jus poster. First your employer can not question you once you request a Stewart or other Union member when the questioning could lead to disciplinary action.

To do so violates the Weigarten rule, These rights, established by the Supreme Court, in 1975 in the case of NLRB v. WEINGARTEN, INC. (http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=420&invol=251)
must be claimed by the employee. The supervisor has no obligation to inform an employee that s/he is entitled to Union representation. So the right must be claimed by the employee. The supervisor has no obligation to inform an employee that s/he is entitled to Union representation. This is not the same as a 5th amendment right where the police have to notify you of your right to remain silent. The employer is not obligated to, All though most do so their investigation does not get bounced by labor relations or the arbitrator.

To further understand read this brief overview: http://www.umass.edu/usa/weingarten.htm

The rest of your problems must be handled through internal contractual procedure relating to grievances out lined in your contract. As well as discussed at Union meetings up to ,and including strike. Any N.L.R.A violations (Sec.7 and Sec.8) should be processed through the union to the N.L.R.B if there are any.
JoeC

Thank you for this it will be helpful to our effort. If only ours was an organization that had the clout to take an issue all the way to the NLRB. Our last major upset found one of our employees threatening legal action if nothing was done over a fair wages issue. The Business Agent actually came to handle the issue himself after the steward was unable to resolve it and legal action had been threatened. The BA went behind closed doors with the company Vice President and the owner (father and son) refusing to let the employee attend. He was in the meeting for 15 minutes came out and assured the employee that "this is serious and we're going to see that they make it right" and left. Three weeks later the mechanic called the hall to inquire as to how the case was going and was simply told that it had been dropped in the interest of continued good relations with the company. I thank you for your information I wish that I could actually let a legal professional read this contract it is truly laughable.
:rolleyes: