Opinion ID: 446609
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Existing procedures adequately protect employee interests and are consistent with federal labor policy

Text: 50 The Board's previously-followed due process and continuity determination procedures adequately protected the critical rights of employees to be represented by a union selected by a majority of employees in the unit while also protecting union members' rights to run their internal affairs free from unnecessary outside intervention. The procedure allowed the Board to require a post-affiliation representation election on a case-by-case basis if a question concerning representation arose. Where no question arose because the affiliation resulted in an insubstantial change in the certified bargaining representative, the Board recognized the change as a purely internal union matter and amended the certification of the newly-affiliated union without a unit-wide election. It is irrational to discard an effective procedure that neither (1) unnecessarily interferes in internal union affairs, (2) unnecessarily destabilizes the bargaining representative, nor (3) unnecessarily discourages the legitimate decision of independent unions to affiliate, in favor of a new procedure that presents all of those risks. 51 Moreover, we have previously recognized that the existence of adequate safeguards to protect employees' Sec. 7 and Sec. 9(a) rights obviates the need for alternate protective actions. For example, in Silver Spur, the employer refused to bargain with the certified bargaining representative and claimed that the union no longer enjoyed majority status. In rejecting the employer's claim that the refusal to bargain was in the interest of protecting employees' Sec. 7 and Sec. 9(a) rights, we noted that if a majority of employees in a bargaining unit no longer supported the union, they could seek the union's decertification. 623 F.2d at 578. 14 Here, the Board's continuity determination protects employees' Sec. 7 and Sec. 9(a) rights, and the employees' right to petition for decertification remains an additional and viable option for employees genuinely disgruntled by a union's affiliation decision. 52