FRONT ROYAL, Va. — Members of the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen have voted against ratification of the tentative agreement union leaders had reached with the U.S. Class I railroads on Sept. 15.
Nearly 61% of the rank and file voted no, while 39% voted yes for the proposed contract. The two sides now will head back to the bargaining table.
Six of the 12 unions representing railroad workers have ratified their contracts. The BRS becomes the second to reject the tentative agreement. The Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees rejected their contract on Oct. 10.
“For the first time that I can remember, the BRS members voted not to ratify a National Agreement, and with the highest participation rate in BRS history,” union President Michael Baldwin said in a statement. Nearly three quarters of the union’s 6,339 members returned their ballots.
Baldwin expressed disappointment with what he called “the lack of good-faith bargaining” on the part of the National Carriers’ Conference Committee, which represents the railroads. He also said the Presidential Emergency Board recommendations, which did not address working conditions such as paid sick leave, played a role in the members’ decision.
The railroads and emergency board also failed to recognize the important work signalmen perform, he added.
“Without signalmen, the roadways and railroad crossings would be unsafe for the traveling public, and they shoulder that heavy burden each day,” Baldwin said. “Additionally, the highest offices at each carrier, as well as their stockholders, seem to forget that the rank-and-file of their employees continued to perform their job each day through an unprecedented pandemic, while the executives worked from home to keep their families safe.”
The proposed contract included a 24% compounded raise over the five-year life of the deal, plus five $1,000 bonuses.
“We are disappointed that the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen has failed to ratify the recent tentative agreement with the nation’s freight railroads, delaying the benefits of the tentative agreement for BRS-represented employees and further extending resolution of the bargaining round with BRS,” the National Railway Labor Conference said in a statement.
The railroads’ negotiating arm adds: “In its announcement regarding the ratification results, BRS asserts that the tentative agreement is inadequate because it does not provide for additional paid sick time. However, the vast majority of BRS members work predictable schedules and all have access to time off. Like other rail employees, they can and do take time off for sickness and already have paid sickness benefits beginning after four days of illness-related absence and extending for up to a year. The structure of these benefits is a function of decades of bargaining where the unions have repeatedly agreed that short-term absences would be unpaid in favor of higher compensation for days worked and more generous sickness benefits for longer absences.”
The rejection results in a status quo period where the BRS will begin new talks with the railroads.
That status quo period will extend to five days after Congress reconvenes, which is currently set for Nov. 14. If Congress returns to session on November 14, there would be no “self help” until after Nov. 19.
But the National Railway Labor Conference said the two sides had agreed to a status quo period until early December. “As such, the failed ratification does not present risk of an immediate service disruption,” the NRLC said.
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