Labor Department Backs Away from Permitting Unions at OSHA Safety Inspections

As we reported last week, the U.S. District Court refused to dismiss a challenge to OSHA’s controversial 2013 Fairfax Memorandum, which allowed for the participation of union representatives in OSHA safety inspections at workplaces where the union did not represent the workers.   We asked at the time whether the Trump Administration would continue to defend that change in policy.  This week, we saw the first concrete evidence suggesting that OSHA is at least reconsidering and may at a minimum drop its defense of the practice.

On Monday February 13^th, OSHA filed an Unopposed Motion For Extension of time, requesting an additional 30 days to file an answer to the complaint, which otherwise would have been due today, February 17^th. As OSHA’s lawyers explained in the Motion, the agency stated that “the extension of the deadline for defendants to answer is necessary to allow incoming leadership personnel at the United States Department of Labor adequate time to consider the issues.”

While it may be risky to predict with assurance what the outcome will be of the incoming leadership’s assessment of the issues, there is a strong likelihood that the new leadership may abandon not only the defense of this legal challenge but that they will also return to the interpretation of the OSHA regulation allowing for an employee representative at such Safety Walkarounds until 2013. As OSHA’s own rules make clear, while employees have the right to an employee representative present, the “authorized representative(s) shall be an employee(s) of the employer,” unless “good cause is shown why accompaniment by a third party who is not an employee of the employer (such as an industrial hygienist or a safety engineer) is reasonably necessary to the conduct of an effective and thorough physical inspection of the workplace, such third party may  accompany the Compliance Safety and Health Officer during the inspection.”

With the new administration’s nomination of R. Alexander Acosta, it appears that the new incoming leadership may be taking shape at the Department of Labor.  No doubt, the question of union representation at OSHA safety walkarounds will be only one of many issues that the incoming leadership personnel at the United States Department of Labor will be taking time to reconsider.