Amazon accused the brand new union at a New York City warehouse of threatening employees except they voted to organise, an assertion an lawyer for the labor group known as “really absurd.”

A second labour group, the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU), which was shedding a bid to organise an Amazon warehouse in Alabama, additionally filed objections on Thursday to that union election.

The US National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is giving Amazon till April 22 to again up its objections to final week’s election in New York, through which Staten Island employees voted to type the corporate’s first US union. Amazon had requested additional time to supply proof as a result of its objections are “substantial,” it mentioned in a submitting Wednesday.

A licensed election consequence would give organised labour a foothold within the United States’ second-largest non-public employer, with the potential to change how Amazon manages its finely tuned operation.

Some 55 p.c of employees who voted within the election at Amazon’s JFK8 warehouse within the New York City borough of Staten Island opted to affix the Amazon Labor Union (ALU), which has demanded larger pay and job safety. Since the consequence, US employees from one other 50 Amazon websites have contacted the union, the group’s chief has mentioned.

Among Amazon’s deliberate objections to the result are that the ALU interfered with staff in line to vote and that lengthy waits depressed turnout, Amazon’s submitting mentioned. Some 58 p.c of eligible voters forged ballots in particular person over a number of days.

Eric Milner, an lawyer representing the ALU from legislation agency Simon & Milner, dismissed Amazon’s claims as false and mentioned they might be overruled.

“To say that the Amazon Labor Union was threatening employees is really absurd,” he mentioned. “The Amazon Labor Union is Amazon employees.”

Separately on Thursday, the RWDSU objected to the election in Bessemer, Alabama, through which Amazon employees voted towards unionising. It was the second election in Bessemer, after the NLRB decided that Amazon had improperly interfered within the first contest there final yr. The most up-to-date final result is pending in mild of lots of of challenged ballots and now the RWDSU’s objections, which might delay a consequence for months.

Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel mentioned, “We want our employees’ voices to be heard, and we hope the NLRB counts every valid vote.”

In a submitting, the RWDSU mentioned Amazon unlawfully eliminated pro-union literature from non-work areas and terminated an worker who spoke in favor of the union throughout obligatory work conferences, amongst different objections. The RWDSU mentioned these have been grounds for the NLRB to put aside the consequence.

, such because the union’s communications with employees round using a mailbox on warehouse property, including that its submitting objections is commonplace course of.

The retailer faces a excessive bar in demonstrating that the New York union violated guidelines for engagement with staff that influenced the result, mentioned John Logan, a labor professor at San Francisco State University.

In addition, the NLRB usually treats employers’ alleged violations extra significantly than alleged wrongdoing by unions as a result of corporations have larger energy over employees, he mentioned.

“It’s going to be really tough” for Amazon, he mentioned.

© Thomson Reuters 2022