Be Fair to Unfair Labor Practice Strikers, Labor Board Says
To ensure adequate staffing and continuity of patient care, hospitals faced with impending strikes by registered nurses often contract with employment agencies to supply temporary replacements. Typically, these agencies require the hospitals to ensure employment of the replacements for multiple days, no matter how long the strike lasts. These contractual obligations often are a reason hospitals may refuse to reinstate strikers at the end of a strike, postponing reinstatement until the contractual obligation is fulfilled. In Pacific Mutual Door, 278 NLRB 854, 856 (1986), the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) held that fulfillment of a short, multi-day contract obligation with an employment agency that supplied the employer with temporary replacements for strikers was a lawful reason for refusing to reinstate returning strikers until the obligation was fulfilled, and not at the end of the strike.