Verizon Communications Inc., the
biggest U.S. local-telephone company, said it was ordered by an
arbitrator to reinstate more than 2,000 employees fired last year.
Verizon violated labor-contract terms when it eliminated the
New York-based jobs, arbitrator Shyam Das said, according to the
Communications Workers of America union. An additional 1,129 fired
employees in other states have a hearing pending, Verizon said.
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“The decision gives all the people that were laid off a new
lease on life,” Larry Mancino, a CWA vice president, said in an
interview. “The reasons they gave were not in line with the
contract language.”
New York-based Verizon last month began talks with the CWA
and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers union,
which together represent about 75,000 company employees whose
contracts expire in August. Verizon is pushing for agreements that
lower its health-care expenses, while the unions want greater
leeway in organizing membership at Verizon’s wireless unit.
Verizon eliminated the positions in December, citing an
economic slowdown and competition from rivals, spokesman Eric Rabe
said.
The arbitrator said contracts bar the company from firing
workers for those reasons, the union said.
Contracts for Verizon workers in New York stipulate that the
company can’t lay off workers because of so-called “process
change,” referring to innovations in technology or work
procedures that make some jobs obsolete, Verizon and the CWA said
in statements. The company can fire workers due to “external
events,” such as the loss of a contract, Rabe said.
“The arbitrator backed CWA’s position that the economic
reasons cited by Verizon for the layoffs did not meet the
definition of external events as negotiated by the parties,” the
CWA said in a statement.
Verizon said in a statement it disagrees with the
arbitrator’s decision.
“The company believes that it followed the contract in
laying off employees,” Verizon said in the statement.
Bloomberg News
