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PCE/BARGAINING UNIT San Miguel vs.

SMC Supervisors and Exempt However, such fact does not apply to the position of Payroll Master and the whole gamut of employees who, as perceived by petitioner, has access to salary and compensation data. The CA correctly held that the position of Payroll Master does not involve dealing with confidential labor relations information in the course of the performance of his functions. Since the nature of his work does not pertain to company rules and regulations and confidential labor relations, it follows that he cannot be excluded from the subject bargaining unit. In this regard, the CA correctly ruled that the positions of Human Resource Assistant and Personnel Assistant belong to the category of confidential employees and, hence, are excluded from the bargaining unit, considering their respective positions and job descriptions. As Human Resource Assistant,[34] the scope of ones work necessarily involves labor relations, recruitment and selection of employees, access to employees' personal files and compensation package, and human resource management. As regards a Personnel Assistant,[35] one's work includes the recording of minutes for management during collective bargaining negotiations, assistance to management during grievance meetings and administrative investigations, and securing legal advice for labor issues from the petitioners team of lawyers, and implementation of company programs. Therefore, in the discharge of their functions, both gain access to vital labor relations information which outrightly disqualifies them from union membership.

DUTY TO BARGAIN COLLECTIVELY Kiok Loy vs NLRC A Company's refusal to make counter proposal if considered in relation to the entire bargaining process, may indicate bad faith and this is specially true where the Union's request for a counter proposal is left unanswered. Neither are WE persuaded by petitioner-company's stand that the Collective Bargaining Agreement which was approved and adopted by the NLRC is a total nullity for it lacks the company's consent, much less its argument that once the Collective Bargaining Agreement is implemented, the Company will face the prospect of closing down because it has to pay a staggering amount of economic benefits to the Union that will equal if not exceed its capital. Such a stand and the evidence in support thereof should have been presented before the Labor Arbiter which is the proper forum for the purpose. We agree with the pronouncement that it is not obligatory upon either side of a labor controversy to precipitately accept or agree to the proposals of the other. But an erring party should not be tolerated and allowed with impunity to resort to schemes feigning negotiations by going through empty gestures. More so, as in the instant case, where the intervention of the National Labor Relations Commission was properly sought for after conciliation efforts undertaken by the BLR failed. The instant case being a certified one, it must be resolved by the NLRC pursuant to the mandate of P.D. 873, as amended, which authorizes the said body to determine the reasonableness of the terms and conditions of employment embodied in any Collective Bargaining Agreement.

MANDATORY PROVISIONS OF THE CBA University of the Immaculate Concepcion vs. SOLE

As in all other contracts, there must be clear indications that the parties reached a meeting of the minds. In this case, no CBA could be concluded because of what the union perceived as illegal deductions from the 70% employees' share in the tuition fee increase from which the salary increases shall be charged. Also, the manner of computing the net incremental proceeds was yet to be agreed upon by the parties. Petitioner insisted that a new collective bargaining agreement was concluded through the conciliation proceeding before the NCMB on all issues specified in the notice of strike. Although it is true that the university and the union may have reached an agreement on the issues raised during the collective bargaining negotiations, still no agreement was concluded by them because, among other reasons, the DOLE Secretary, who assumed jurisdiction on January 23, 1995 only was set to resolve the distribution of the salary increase of the covered employees. The Court of Appeals found that "there are many items in the draft-CBA that were not even mentioned in the minutes of the July 20, 1994 conference." Considering the parties failed to reach an agreement regarding certain items of the CBA, they still have the duty to negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement in good faith, pursuant to the applicable provisions of the Labor Code.

GRIEVANCE PROCEDURE Master Iron vs. NLRC Petitioners contend that notwithstanding the non-strike provision in the CBA, the strike they staged was legal because the reasons therefor are non-economic in nature. They assert that the NLRC abused its discretion in holding that there was "failure to exhaust the provision on grievance procedure" in view of the fact that they themselves sought grievance meetings but the Corporation ignored such requests. In holding that the strike was illegal, the NLRC relied solely on the no-strike no-lockout provision of the CBA aforequoted. As this Court has held, a no-strike clause in a CBA is applicable only to economic strikes. Corollarily, if the strike is founded on an unfair labor practice of the employer, a strike declared by the union cannot be considered a violation of the no-strike clause. Private respondent's failure to traverse petitioners' allegations that the NLRC abused its discretion in holding that the provision on grievance procedure had not been exhausted clearly sustains such allegation and upholds the petitioners' contention that the Corporation refused to undergo said procedure. It should be remembered that a grievance procedure is part of the continuous process of collective bargaining. It is intended to promote a friendly dialogue between labor and management as a means of maintaining industrial peace. The Corporation's refusal to heed petitioners' request to undergo the grievance procedure clearly demonstrated its lack of intent to abide by the terms of the CBA.

San Miguel Corp. vs. NLRC Collective Bargaining Deadlock is defined as the situation between the labor and the management of the company where there is failure in the collective bargaining negotiations resulting in a stalemate. This situation, is nonexistent in the present case since there is a Board assigned on the third level (Step 3) of the grievance machinery to resolve the conflicting views of the parties. Instead of asking the Conciliation Board composed of five representatives each from the company and the union, to decide the conflict, petitioner declared a deadlock, and thereafter, filed a notice of strike. For failing to exhaust all the steps in the grievance machinery and arbitration

proceedings provided in the Collective Bargaining Agreement, the notice of strike should have been dismissed by the NLRC and private respondent union ordered to proceed with the grievance and arbitration proceedings.

VOLUNTARY ARBITRATION University of San Agustin vs. CA On the first issue, the SC ruled that ART. 263 of the Labor Code provides: ."..Such assumption or certification (of the SOLE) shall have the effect of automatically enjoining the intended or impending strike or lockout as specified in the assumption or certification order. If one has already taken place at the time of assumption or certification, all striking or locked out employees shall immediately return to work and the employer shall immediately resume operations and readmit all workers under the same terms and conditions prevailing before the strike or lockout." The phrase "immediately return to work" indicates an almost instantaneous or automatic compliance for a striker to return to work once an AJO has been duly served. Therefore, the act of the striking employees is violative of the foregoing provision. On the second issue, the Supreme Court ruled that economic benefits, which included the issue on the formula in computing the TIP share of the employees, is one that arises from the interpretation or implementation of the CBA, and these matters should be referred to a Voluntary Arbitrator, as provided in Art. 261 and 262 of the Labor Code. The peculiar facts of the instant case show that the University was deprived of a remedy that would have enjoined the Union strike and was left without any recourse except to invoke the jurisdiction of the SOLE.

NO STRIKE/NO LOCKOUT NUWRAIN/Dusit The peculiar circumstances in the present case validate the Secretary's decision to order payroll reinstatement instead of actual reinstatement. It is obviously impracticable for the Hotel to actually reinstate the employees who shaved their heads or cropped their hair because this was exactly the reason they were prevented from working in the first place. Further, as with most labor disputes which have resulted in strikes, there is mutual antagonism, enmity, and animosity between the union and the management. Payroll reinstatement, most especially in this case, would have been the only avenue where further incidents and damages could be avoided. Public officials entrusted with specific jurisdictions enjoy great confidence from this Court. The Secretary surely meant only to ensure industrial peace as she assumed jurisdiction over the labor dispute. In this case, we are not ready to substitute our own findings in the absence of a clear showing of grave abuse of discretion on her part. The Union maintains that the mass picket conducted by its officers and members did not constitute a strike and was merely an expression of their grievance resulting from the lockout effected by the Hotel management. On the other hand, the Hotel argues that the Union's deliberate defiance of the company rules and regulations was a concerted effort to paralyze the operations of the Hotel, as the Union officers and members knew pretty well that they would not be allowed to work in their bald or cropped hair style. For this reason, the Hotel argues that the Union committed an illegal strike on January 18, 2002 and on January 26, 2002. First, the Union's violation of the Hotel's Grooming Standards was clearly a deliberate and concerted action to undermine the authority of and to embarrass the Hotel and was, therefore, not a protected action. The appearances of the Hotel employees directly reflect the character and well-being of the Hotel, being a five-star hotel that provides service to top-notch clients. Being bald or having cropped hair per se does not evoke negative or unpleasant

feelings. The reality that a substantial number of employees assigned to the food and beverage outlets of the Hotel with full heads of hair suddenly decided to come to work bald-headed or with cropped hair, however, suggests that something is amiss and insinuates a sense that something out of the ordinary is afoot. Obviously, the Hotel does not need to advertise its labor problems with its clients. It can be gleaned from the records before us that the Union officers and members deliberately and in apparent concert shaved their heads or cropped their hair. This was shown by the fact that after coming to work on January 18, 2002, some Union members even had their heads shaved or their hair cropped at the Union office in the Hotel's basement. Clearly, the decision to violate the company rule on grooming was designed and calculated to place the Hotel management on its heels and to force it to agree to the Union's proposals. The facts are clear that the strike arose out of a bargaining deadlock in the CBA negotiations with the Hotel. The concerted action is an economic strike upon which the afore-quoted "no strike/work stoppage and lockout" prohibition is squarely applicable and legally binding.

Panay Electric vs. NLRC Be that as it may, we cannot sustain the charge of unfair labor practice against the Company. As admitted by Huyan and the Union, the principal cause behind this controversy is the Company's suspicion that Huyan was "MAO." That Huyan was the Union vice-president was purely incidental. Put in another way, any employee who was suspected of being "MAO" would have been the object of the Company's moves, irrespective of whether that employee is a union officer or not. Huyan was not pinpointed because he was a union officer or because the Company is anti-union but rather because of the suspicion that he wrote the column that caught the ire of the company's Operations Manager. No matter how detestable, the resultant moves of the company cannot be considered unfair labor practice. It has heretofore been held that a "no strike, no lock-out" provision in the Collective Bargaining Agreement ("CBA") is a valid stipulation although the clause may be invoked by an employer only when the strike is economic in nature or one which is conducted to force wage or other concessions from the employer that are not mandated to be granted by the law itself. It would be inapplicable to prevent a strike which is grounded on unfair labor practice. In this situation, it is not essential that the unfair labor practice act has, in fact, been committed; it suffices that the striking workers are shown to have acted honestly on an impression that the company has committed such unfair labor practice and the surrounding circumstances could warrant such a belief in good faith. In the case of the other union officers, however, the NLRC, having found no sufficient proof to hold them guilty of "bad faith" in taking part in the strike or of perpetrating "serious disorders" during the concerted activity, merely decreed suspension. We see no grave abuse of discretion by the NLRC in this regard and in not thus ordering the dismissal of said officers.

LABOR MANAGEMENT COUNCIL PAL vs. NLRC Such provision in the CBA may not be interpreted ascession of employees' rights to participate in the deliberation of matters which may affect their rights and the formulation of policies relative thereto. And one such matter is the formulationof a code of discipline. Industrial peace cannot be achieved if theemployees are denied their just participation in the discussion of matters affecting their rights.

Union of Filipino Employees vs. Nestle No test per se of bad faith. Drawn from facts. legal presumption of good faith. Overcome by substantial evidence.

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