Amendment Targets Official Time

Employees who are union representatives use official time to help address labor-management issues, and to aid employees in cases of alleged discrimination or retaliation, and disciplinary actions. Critics charge that official time is too expensive, while labor groups maintain that it saves time and money by avoiding litigation and time-consuming procedural avenues for settling disputes.

“Federal unions are legally required to provide full representation to all members of a bargaining unit, whether or not the worker elects to pay voluntary union dues,” Junemann wrote. “In exchange for being forced to provide representation to dues payers and non-dues payers alike, the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 permits federal unions to bargain official time arrangements to the mutual benefit of labor and management.”

A labor group is calling on House lawmakers to reject an amendment to the fiscal 2016 Interior, Environment and Related Agencies appropriations bill that would eliminate the use of so-called official time for employees covered by the bill.

A labor group is calling on House lawmakers to reject an amendment to the fiscal 2016 Interior, Environment and Related Agencies appropriations bill that would eliminate the use of so-called official time for employees covered by the bill (H.R. 2822).

In a July 8 letter to House members, International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers President Gregory Junemann urged representatives to withhold support for the measure, which was offered by Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.).

“It is already illegal to use official time for union business (i.e., recruiting, organizing, political activities, etc.),” he noted. “Union representation for employees working their way through administrative procedures is a cost-effective process for administrating and adjudicating agency policies, instead of having the government needlessly end up paying costly third party attorneys and arbitrator fees.”

Junemann said the House “has overwhelmingly rejected similar amendments like this one in the recent past,” and urged lawmakers to reject the Buck amendment as well.

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