000431 Texas Wal-Mart Workers Vote On Union

Dallas, TX - Meat workers at a second Texas Wal-Mart store voted on whether to join a union but the results will not be known until federal mediators rule on an appeal by the retail chain against the vote, both sides said.

The election came two months after meat cutters at another Texas Wal-Mart held the first successful unionizing vote at the world's biggest retail chain, Wal-Mart Stores Inc.

The organizing votes only affect about 10 workers in the meat department at each store, out of over 300 employees at the Wal-Mart Supercenters.

But the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, one of the nation's largest unions with 1.4 million members, considers even a small presence a valuable inroad into the traditionally non-union retail chain.

Meat workers at a Wal-Mart Supercenter in the East Texas town of Palestine cast their ballots at work, union spokeswoman Jill Cashen said.

The ballot box was then taken away by representatives of the National Labour Relations Board and the votes will not be counted unless the board dismisses Wal-Mart's appeal.

“The board decided to let the election go ahead but impound the ballots until the appeal is resolved. We hope the workers won't have to wait too long,” Cashen said.

Bentonville, Arkansas-based Wal-Mart Stores Inc said it appealed last week, arguing that the meat workers cannot be considered a separate work force from the rest of the store and should not be able to call a union vote on their own.

The NLRB rejected similar arguments by Wal-Mart last year, deciding instead that their job responsibilities and pay scale made the meat cutters a separate unit.

That NLRB decision paved the way for the successful union vote on February 17 in the meat department of a Wal-Mart Supercenter in Jacksonville, Texas, about 30 miles northeast of Palestine.

Before the Jacksonville vote, only a few Canadian employees were unionized because of requirements by regulators there.

Wal-Mart says it has an “open door” approach to labour relations that makes unions unnecessary.

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