Joel Dillard & Associates

On Friday, the National Labor Relations Board issued a resounding victory to the employees of Victory Casino Cruises, a gambling boat operating out of Jacksonville and Cape Canaveral, Florida. The Board found multiple violations of federal law.

The employer had a policy prohibiting employees from disclosing compensation data and disciplinary actions, among many other things, and had a second policy stating that the company consideres all information about present or past employees to be confidential and prohibiting its disclosure to anyone.

The unanimous Board found that these policies violate federal law. As the majority of the Board panel (Hirozawa and McFerran) found it is settled that Section 7 of the Act grants employees the right to discuss information about other employees and it is likewise settled that employees have a Section 7 right to discuss their conditions of employment with third parties, such as union representatives, Board agents, and the public in general. As Republican appointee Phillip Miscimarra stated in his concurring opinion on this point, the right to engage in protected concerted activity involving the disclosure of such information is central to the Act. (Read more about Free Speech Rights at Work on the blog.)

The Board majority also struck down a mandatory arbitration agreement, which was essentially the same as those at issue in the Board's prior decisions in D.R. Horton and Murphy Oil. Miscimarra dissented for the same reasons as in Murphy Oil.

This is a strong decision in favor of workers' rights. Read the full decision here. I highly recommend a careful reading of both majority and concurring views about the confidentiality provisions.

The charging party employee in this matter was represented by Joel Dillard, P.A., and The Bonderud Law Firm, P.A.

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