A bill that would provide full collective bargaining rights to Title 38 medical professionals at the Department of Veterans Affairs has been reintroduced in the House with 103 original co-sponsors.
The VA Employees Fairness Act was reintroduced on Sept. 25 by House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs Ranking Member Mark Takano, D-Calif.
Title 38 VA employees are physicians, dentists, podiatrists, registered nurses, physician assistants, optometrists, chiropractors, and expanded-function dental auxiliaries. They have very limited collective bargaining rights compared with their counterparts in other federal agencies, state and local government systems, the private sector or even within the VA who work under Title 5 like psychologists and pharmacists.
They, for example, are not allowed to negotiate over routine workplace issues like scheduling and raise grievances over things like staffing shortages that undermine patient care or in situations where the VA fails to provide promotion and advancement opportunities that would attract health care workers to the VA. They’re also not allowed to challenge management violations of pay laws or the VA’s own policies.
This has resulted in job stress, burnout, and low morale, and the VA’s inability to recruit and retain medical professionals. Chronic understaffing hurts patient safety, workplace safety, and leads to overuse of expensive contract nurses and doctors.
The VA Employees Fairness Act would change that by granting Title 38 employees the same workplace rights as Title 5 employees with whom they work alongside.
“On behalf of the 304,000 VA employees our union represents, 75,000 of whom would be impacted by this law, we applaud Representative Mark Takano for introducing critical legislation that provides voice to those who work day and night to provide the highest quality of care to our nation's veterans,” said AFGE National VA Council President Alma Lee.
Lee added that the lack of full collective bargaining rights at the VA has driven thousands of its healthcare providers to the private sector.
AFGE earlier this year testified at a hearing over Title 38 employees’ inability to grieve routine payroll errors and voiced support for the VA Correct Compensation Act, another bill introduced by Takano and Rep. Mike Bost, R-Ill., that would address the issue.