Oct. 17, 2024
The NLRB has announced that from October 1, 2023, to September 30, 2024, it received 3,286 union election petitions, which represents a 27 percent increase over FY 2023, when the agency received 2,593 petitions. Moreover, the number of petitions received in FY 2024 is more than double that of FY 2021, when the NLRB received 1,638 petitions.
Petitions and charges up. Likewise, from FY 2023 to FY 2024, unfair labor practice charge filings increased by seven percent (from 19,869 to 21,292 cases), the Board reported. In total, it added, its field offices received a total of 24,578 cases, which represents the highest total case intake in over a decade.
“The surge in cases we’ve received in the last few years is a testament to workers knowing and exercising their rights under the National Labor Relations Act and to our board agents’ accessibility and respectful engagement with them,” said NLRB General Counsel Jennifer Abruzzo.
The increase in cases filed also caused an increase in cases for the adjudicative side of the agency. In FY 2024, the Board received 393 unfair labor practice and representation cases, up 22 percent from last year. The Board issued 259 decisions, representing a five percent increase from FY 2023.
Intake up, staffing not. As has previously been the case, however, the jump in case intake led the NLRB to end FY 2024 with 288 pending cases, which is 46 percent more than the number left pending at the end of FY 2023 (197 cases). The increased workload comes as the NLRB continues to deal with funding and staffing shortages.
“The NLRB’s dedicated employees have worked hard this year to process cases efficiently, but the ongoing surge in case intake continues to increase our backlog,” said Chairman Lauren McFerran. “Additional resources are necessary to enable the Board to expand staffing capacity and ensure that the workers, employers, and unions that rely on our agency benefit from timely resolution of their labor disputes.”
Source: Written by Brandi O. Brown, J.D.
From WCI's HR Answers Now ©2024 CCH Incorporated and its affiliates. All rights reserved.
Tags: Employers' Blog Posts