The Labor Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (LMRDA) has long required an employer and labor relations consultant to disclose details of their relationship when a consultant is retained to persuade employees whether to exercise their rights to unionize. Historically, the reporting requirements have not included “advice” by consultants or lawyers that employers can accept or reject, but instead applied when consultants spoke directly to employees about organizing.
Five years ago, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) proposed significantly broadening the disclosure requirements and considerably narrowing the advice exception.
What is the practical impact of this? Public disclosure of the contractual details of many types of attorney-client relationships that are currently considered confidential under ethics rules applicable to lawyers.
Tomorrow, DOL intends to publish its final revisions; implementing these changes and requiring the new rules to be used for any arrangements entered into or payments made on or after July 1, 2016. While DOL has made some nuanced changes to the proposal, the final rule will require employers to carefully consider their relationships with labor consultants and attorneys to fully understand whether these arrangements will be subject to disclosure requirements.
The final rule can be found here.