Feb 12 2025
Amanda DeMatteis: Hi, Josh.
Josh Goodbaum: Hi, Amanda. What are we talking about today?
DeMatteis: I thought we would talk about a Connecticut employee who is a member of a union — and therefore has a collective bargaining agreement — and they’ve been terminated, and they feel as though their employer did not have cause for that termination. What do they do? Do they go through the union? Do they talk to an employment lawyer like me and you? What comes first?
Goodbaum: If you’ve been terminated in violation of your collective bargaining agreement, I think the first step is to speak with your union and the appropriate representative of the union. Maybe that’s the steward; maybe it’s someone at the national union; maybe it’s a union lawyer.
There’s sort of three reasons for that.
The first is that the union, which presumably negotiated the collective bargaining agreement with management on behalf of all the members of the union, is gonna know that agreement best. They’re gonna know what the rights are under that union contract. They probably don’t even need to read the CBA very carefully to know exactly what it says.
The second reason is that, in most situations – it depends on the collective bargaining agreement, but for most contracts – the union is the organization that has the standing to file an arbitration to challenge a breach of that collective bargaining agreement. In other words, you as an individual unionized employee – as a member of the union that has a collective bargaining agreement – don’t have a right in and of yourself to sue your employer for violating that collective bargaining agreement. The union has to do it for you.
And the third reason that is you’re already paying for the union, and you probably don’t have to pay anything more for the union to speak with you. Whereas you and I, Amanda, we’re probably gonna charge for that conversation.
So, you might as well start with the folks who know best, the folks who have the ability to act, and the folks who are free or at least you already paid for.
DeMatteis: Now, let’s say you go through that process, and it doesn’t work out. Maybe the union decides, “Sorry, we’re not going to pursue this,” or you lose at whatever type of arbitration or even pre-arbitration setting. Now you’re saying, “Well, you know what, not only do I think that this termination was for cause, but I think I was terminated because of my disability or my race or my sex, or because I just took a medical leave or something else that is protected by statute.” What happens then?
Goodbaum: If you think not just that you were terminated without cause in violation of your collective bargaining agreement, but also that you were terminated for what we would think of as an unlawful reason based on some protected characteristic or protected conduct, you still want to talk with the union initially, but you also want to talk with an employment lawyer initially.
That’s true for two reasons.
One – while the union is the expert in what’s in the collective bargaining agreement, employment lawyers like you and I are really the experts in what the law requires.
And two – in theory at least, you could go through an arbitration concerning the issue of termination for cause and, if you lose, you might be precluded or prohibited from bringing certain kinds of claims against your employer in court. That’s not necessarily so, but you want to make sure before you go all the way with the cause challenge that you’ve explored what the consequences of going forward with that cause challenge would be.
So, if you are a unionized worker who has a collective bargaining agreement who believes that you were terminated without cause and believes that your employer was motivated by an unlawful reason – your protected characteristic or your protected conduct – you should both talk with the union and with an employment lawyer. There’s a possibility there to coordinate our efforts, and ethical and responsible employment lawyers like you and I, Amanda, are not going to advise a client to charge forward with a lawsuit if we’re confident that the union process, the arbitration process, is going to get that employee what they need. But it’s better to have that conversation at the outset rather than at the end of the process when you can no longer take account of the consequences.
DeMatteis: And also, don’t forget: there are time limitations for any of these unlawful reasons that a person may be terminated here in Connecticut and across the country. So, you want to be really cognizant of what those timing deadlines are so that, while you’re going through this arbitration proceeding, you aren’t at the same time costing yourself the right to go forward with those statutory claims because you’ve blown a deadline.
Goodbaum: That’s a great point, Amanda. Thanks for adding that.
Thank you all for watching, and we’ll see you next time. Take care.
Posted by Garrison, Levin-Epstein, Fitzgerald & Pirrotti, P.C. in Commentary
Tagged Amanda DeMatteis, Joshua Goodbaum, Wrongful Termination
