Media Center

The First National Guild of Healthcare Providers of the Lower Extremity/OPEIU Guild 45 is celebrating a major legislative victory with today’s signing into law of the VA MISSION Act*, which includes language that reclassifies podiatrists as podiatric surgeons within the VA Health Administration and puts them in the same pay category as their allopathic and osteopathic peers.

This represents the largest advancement for federally employed podiatrists since 1976 and is the first bill specific to podiatry passed by the United States Congress.

The Supreme Court issued a 5–4 decision Monday in Epic Systems v. Lewis allowing employers to deprive their workers of their right to sue collectively. Its ruling, written by Justice Neil Gorsuch, blasts a massive hole through post–New Deal labor law, hobbling employees’ ability to recover in court when their employers underpay them. It is difficult to overstate how devastating Epic Systems is to labor rights in America—and how far Gorsuch strays from federal law in order to implement his preferred economic policy.

Watch this video from the Solidarity Center, AFL-CIO and ITUC about efforts to pass an ILO standard on gender-based violence at work. Employers, government and labor representatives will debate a draft gender-based violence at work standard beginning May 28 at the UN in Geneva. Six-hundred workers from around the world will be there, working to ensure the final standard is strong. Watch this video and see what you can do to help.

https://youtu.be/dOkcez2nwvg

OPEIU has been awarded first place in the general excellence category for web design and content by the The Metro New York Labor Communications Awards. The award honors excellence in all facets of website design and content, including timely and relevant news, user interface and accessibility and the effective use of graphic, typographic, layout and structural elements.

 

OPEIU President Richard Lanigan was also honored for his op-ed, He’s Now on the Supreme Court, But Does He Care About Working People, which appeared in White Collar, Issue 537, Spring/Summer 2017. All issues of White Collar can be found under the Member Resources tab.