Gov. Bill Ritter today issued a late-in-the-day veto killing a bill that would have favored grocery store workers in ongoing negotiations over their union contract with Colorado’s major supermarket chains.
“The parties to these negotiations have been working hard for several months to try to reach an agreement,” Ritter wrote in his veto message. “I believe it is ill-advised and counterproductive to enact legislation that materially impacts the relative bargaining position of parties in the midst of ongoing negotiations.”
House Bill 1170 would have made it easier for workers who are locked out of their job sites to receive state unemployment payments.
The bill is one of a handful watched this year by business and labor interests anxious to see with whom Ritter would side.
The measure would have changed the standard for whether locked-out workers get benefits from “which side started the fight” to “who stands to gain from it.”
Right now if unions provoke a lockout at one chain – by striking at another chain, for instance – workers cannot collect unemployment. The vetoed legislation would have allowed locked out workers to get unemployment if the contract management proposed would have cut their pay or benefits.
Advocates for the legislation argued that the bill would provide protection to low-income workers during tough economic times.
Critics questioned the timing of the bill, which would have taken effect mid-negotiations, and said it would drain the state’s already dwindling unemployment fund.
Jessica Fender: 303-954-1244 or jfender@denverpost.com.
