Brinks Court Decision Correction – SB 6867

 

 

SB 6867 proposes to change state law to attempt to reverse the recent Brinks court decision that requires employers, in many cases, to pay employees who drive home company vehicles.   The Brinks court decision imposes undue hardships on both employees and employers and will cause greater and unnecessary traffic congestion if not reversed.  The Brinks court decision applies to Brinks Home Security installers and requires that the time employees drive the company vehicle from their home to their first work location and from their last work location to home be considered work time.

 

SB 6867 attempts to correct the Brinks decision stating that such drive time is not work time.

 

 establish a State Labor Relations Act that will apply where the National Labor Relations Act does not apply.  The National Labor Relations Act does not apply to firms with less than $500,000 in retail sales or $50,000 in interstate commerce – clearly meaning many very small businesses.  SB 6835 would set up new laws and regulations these very small employers would have to comply with in dealing with labor unions.  It would give the authority to set up these new state regulations to the current Public Employees Relation Commission (PERC) that oversees collective bargaining issues for the state of Washington’s public employees.

 

IBA strongly supports legislation to reverse the Brinks court decision and SB 6867 is the only legislation designed to do this.

 

You can view a copy of SB 6867 by clicking on the following link SB 6867 - 2007-08  You will need a pdf reader program on your computer to view HB 2383 and you can click on the following link to install a FREE pdf reader program on your computer http://www.ibaw.net/pdf/

 

IBA urges you to contact your legislators and express your opposition to this legislation.  Below is a sample letter that you can also use as the basis of a phone call.  You can identify your legislators via the Internet at www.ibaw.net/findleg, or by calling 1-800-562-6000.

 

 

 

Month xx, 2008

 

The Honorable ____________                       

Washington State Senate

Olympia, WA  98504                                                  

 

Re:  SB 6867 – Fixing The Brinks Court Decision

 

Dear Senator _________:

 

As a small business owner from ____city name_______, I urge you to support SB 6867.  This legislation proposes to clarify the recent Brinks court decision that found that a worker taking a company vehicle home must be considered working while driving the company vehicle home.   This court decision is imposing severe and unnecessary hardships on employees and employers.  SB 6867 will provide a reasonable clarification to the Brinks court decision and allow employees to continue to take company vehicles home in certain circumstances.  Without SB 6867, affected employees will become less productive and lose income, and customers will face higher prices due to the loss in worker productivity.   The Brinks court decision is an anomaly for Washington State as compared to other states and needs to be fixed.

 

SB 6867 is an important piece of legislation and we urge you to support it.

 

Please advise us of your position on SB 6867.

 

Thank you,

 

Sign your name

 

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