LITTLE ROCK — The National Labor Relations Board has closed its investigation into whether Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and one of its union-funded critic groups violated provisions of the National Labor Relations Act in the weeks leading to Black Friday sales.
Nancy Cleeland, public affairs director for the labor relations board, said the agency ended its investigation last week and that a report was sent to the agency’s headquarters for additional legal review. There is no date set for releasing the investigation’s results, she said.
Cleeland said the agency could seek an injunction, as Wal-Mart requested, or the Bentonville-based retailer could take the issue to court to seek an injunction. The agency has received at least 30 complaints of retaliation against employees, she said.
OUR Walmart - Organization United for Respect at Wal-Mart - claims that Wal-Mart told store-level management to threaten workers with “termination, discipline and/or a lawsuit” if they went on strike or engaged in other job actions. The group is funded by the United Food and Commercial Workers union.
Wal-Mart countered with a complaint against the union, saying that the union and its affiliates violated the National Labor Relations Act by picketing and threatening to picket Wal-Mart headquarters and numerous Wal-Mart stores and other facilities. Those actions were accompanied in some cases by mass demonstrations and in-store “flash mobs,” the company said.
In a statement released Friday, David Tovar, Wal-Mart vice president of corporate communications, said: “The number of protests being reported by the UFCW are grossly exaggerated. It was proven last night - and again today - that the OUR Walmart group doesn’t speak for the 1.3 million Walmart associates.”
The union group, however, claims that it staged 1,000 protests in 46 states, and that many Wal-Mart employees walked off the job.
Tovar said that Wal-Mart had its best-ever Black Friday and that OUR Walmart was unable to recruit more than a small number of employees to “participate in these made for-TV events.”
“Press reports are now exposing what we have said all along - the large majority of protesters aren’t even Walmart workers,” he said.
Wal-Mart’s stock closed Monday at $69.91 a share, down 29 cents or 0.4 percent. The stock has traded between $57.00 and $77.60 in the past year.
Business, Pages 21 on 11/27/2012