The Independent News Source
Twitter - Facebook - Email Alerts - RSS
Labor unions, Catholic hospitals reach agreement
Labor document spells out guidelines for Catholic health institutions
Jun. 23, 2009
Cardinal McCarrick (CNS photo)
Printer-friendly version
Send to friend
PDF versionWASHINGTON
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has announced a new step forward for workers at Catholic health facilities: a set of principles to ensure that workers have a fair process to bargain for a better life.
In “Respecting the Just Rights of Workers: Guidance and Options for Catholic Health Care and Unions,” the USCCB, in cooperation with Catholic health care providers and the union movement, has laid out guidelines for Catholic health care ministries across the country.
The document means that labor unions and Catholic leaders have reached an agreement designed to end years of bitter hostilities that often surrounded union efforts to organize workers at Catholic hospitals.
"The central actors in these dramas have to be the workers themselves, that's what we feel is the strength of the document," said Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, retired archbishop of Washington, D.C., who helped lead the discussions.
The accord, announced Monday, seeks to apply Catholic teachings that recognize the right of workers to "freely and fairly" decide whether to join a union.
The new guidelines cover seven principles for employers when workers seek a union:
Respect;
Access to information;
Truthful communication;
Pressure-free environment;
Expeditious process;
Honoring employee decisions; and
Meaningful enforcement of these principles.
The guidelines essentially comprise a “peace agreement” between Catholic health care providers and unions in which Catholic hospitals drop their aggressive tactics in fighting unions, such as delays, one-on-one meetings, captive audience sessions, and threats and intimidations, in exchange for a union’s pledge not to run a public leverage campaign against the hospitals.
One of the key principles directs both employers and unions to refrain from harassing, threatening, intimidating or coercing workers.
Under the agreement, hospital managers agree not to use "traditional anti-union tactics," including hiring firms, known as union-busters, that work with companies to defeat organizing drives. Unions also agree not to publicly attack Catholic health care organizations during labor campaigns.
Nearly 600 Catholic hospitals that employ about 600,000 workers are covered under the agreement. Roughly 15 percent of those workers are currently believed to be union members.
The recommendations do not bind individual bishops, hospitals or unions but provide guidance in how they are expected to conduct themselves during union organizing efforts. Union leaders say it will be easier to organize workers at the nation's Catholic health centers if hospital managers abide by the agreement.
"The theme that runs through all of this as far as I'm concerned is the emphasis on workers' rights to organize as part of church teachings," said AFL-CIO president John Sweeney.
Sweeney called it a landmark moment for health care workers. He said the for reaching this agreement was mutual respect for the histories of both Catholic health care and workers’ rights.
Parties to the accord include the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Catholic Health Association of the United States, the AFL-CIO and the Service Employees International Union.
On the plus side - at least
On the plus side - at least they've finally acknowledged worker rights. On the minus side - how did it take the church this long to become a slightly more christian employer than, say ....WALMART?
Unfortunately, this only applies to hospital workers. Other diocesan employees are still generally treated like it was still the 19th century (at least here in Fort Worth).
I have read the document from
I have read the document from cover to cover and say hoorah for the bishops. Why, however, did they limit the document to health care workers. Why did it not speak to all who labor for the Church, particularly Catholic school teachers. In the Diocese of Scranton, we have the notorious union-buster, Bishop Joseph Martino who busted the union that had represented our Diocesan teachers for more than 30 years. This move devastated a once-flourishing school system and was the beginning of tremendous turmoil under Martino's "leadership." Meanwhile, Diocesan teachers continue to fight to regain their right to organize - even going so far as to push legislation in our state legislature to change the labor relations act in order to obtain bargaining rights. While their cleaning up their act, the bishops should go all the way and set their entire house to order. Their words to those who run Catholic hospitals will ring hollow so long as they don't practice what they preach for those employees more directly under their control.
The Road to Hell is Paved
The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions:
Here we go again. Further evidence that the church is morphing into a public service organization. We need to reenergize our emphasis on saving souls and less on wages. Whatever happened to "thou shalt not covet"? Educated workers in the hospital industry make plenty of money. Doctors, nurses, administrators are generally doing fine. In addition, there is a perpetual shortage of nurses. Unionizing the unskilled and under educated workers causes an unnatural rise in costs. Once wages are artificially raised then healththcare becomes increasingly more expensive (inflation). Thus, fewer people can afford it. Raise your hand if you can figure that out without any help?
The solution is to limit how long a person can work in a no skill/minimum wage job. Those jobs should be saved for high school and college students. They can cover their IPOD tunes, gas and date night expenses with ease. Nobody earns handouts. After 5 years you should be a nurse ($25-$65/hr) with full benefits. You shoud at least be a nurse's assistant. So don't just covet what others make (socalist/democrat party teaching), but make yourself valuable. Then, the world will truly be a better place. Remember the parable of the talents. The master gave money to three servants. The unmotivated servant who only gave back what he received did not please the master. The servant that demonstrated initiative and increased the treasure pleased the master. Unionizing only buries the talents literally and figuratively. Amen.
Unions and Bishops In the
Unions and Bishops
In the Foreword to “Respecting the Just Rights of Workers,” Bishop William Murphy talks about the ten year dialogue exploring “how Catholic social teaching should shape the actions of unions, management and others in assuring workers a free and fair choice on questions of representation in the workplace.” What follows is a blueprint to be followed by management and labor in Catholic Health Care institutions to ensure a process that is “free, fair and respectful.”
Throughout the document, the U.S. Bishops are making clear to Catholic healthcare employers that a worker’s right to unionize is “a fundamental principle of social justice recognized by the church.”
This is the latest social justice document of the U.S. Bishops that all but sky writes DO AS WE SAY, NOT AS WE DO.
Where were the bishops when Cardinal Sean O’Malley cut the Archdiocesan high school system into individual units and discarded the 30 year history of union recognition and negotiated contracts, making the teachers employees at will?
Where were the bishops when former St. Louis Archbishop, Raymond Burke, wrote to teachers in the fledgling elementary teachers’ union that
“Neither the Archdiocese nor individual parishes will recognize or bargain collectively with any organization as a representative of teachers,” while at the same time recognizing and negotiating with the high school union?
Where were the bishops when Scranton bishop Joseph Martino not only busted the Scranton Diocese Association of Catholic Teachers after some 30 years of union recognition but established his own “company union”?
Cardinal McCarrick, formerly of Washington, D.C. sums up the DO AS I SAY - “Catholic social teaching can and should guide relationships between management and labor. It should be up to workers to decide through a fair process whether to be represented by a union. . . we want to ensure that workers make these choices freely and fairly..” while Cardinal McCarrick’s fellow bishops, O’Malley, Burke and Martino, serve as the poster children for the bishops’ Catholic Social Teaching Wall of Shame.
The National Association of Catholic School Teachers is actively working with local Catholic School Teacher unions throughout Pennsylvania to achieve passage of House Bill 26, legislation that will provide safeguards for a fair process of union recognition and collective bargaining.
For now, however, the laborers in the Church’s educational vineyards regard “Respecting the Just Rights of Workers” as but one more example of the Bishops’ failure to Practice What They Preach.
Post new comment