United St Testing v. NLRB ( 1998 )

United States Court of Appeals
FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT
Argued September 10, 1998 Decided November 13, 1998
No. 97-1687
United States Testing Company, Inc.,
Petitioner
v.
National Labor Relations Board,
Respondent
On Petition for Review and Cross-Application
for Enforcement of an Order of the
National Labor Relations Board
Joseph P. Paranac, Jr. argued the cause for petitioner.
With him on the briefs was David F. Jasinski.
Richard A. Cohen, Senior Attorney, National Labor Rela-
tions Board, argued the cause for respondent. With him on
the brief were Linda Sher, Associate General Counsel, and
John D. Burgoyne, Acting Deputy Associate General Counsel.
David S. Habenstreit, Supervisory Attorney, entered an ap-
pearance.
Robert D. Kurnick was on the brief for amicus curiae
International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local Union
1936.
Before: Ginsburg, Sentelle and Rogers, Circuit Judges.
Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge Rogers.
Dissenting opinion filed by Circuit Judge Sentelle.
Rogers, Circuit Judge: The United States Testing Compa-
ny petitions for review of a decision by the National Labor
Relations Board finding violations of the National Labor
Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. s 151 et seq., arising out of the
Company's failure to provide information requested by the
International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local Union
1936 ("the Union") during contract negotiations.1 The Union
requested information about the individual claims experience
of union and nonunion employees in order to respond to the
Company's proposal that union employees contribute to the
medical health benefits plan. The Company provided some
aggregate health cost information to the Union, but not
individual claims experience.
The Board found that the Company rejected the Union's
request and ordered that the information be turned over
without identifying the names of the individual claimants. On
appeal, the Company contends that the Board's findings of
unfair labor practices were unwarranted because the Board
failed to support its finding that the Union met its burden to
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1 The Board concluded that the Company violated s 8(a)(5) and
(1) of the National Labor Relations Act ("Act"), 29 U.S.C. s 158
(a)(5), (1), by refusing to furnish the Union with certain medical
health plan information; s 8(a)(5), and (1), id. s 158(a)(5), (1), by
implementing its final offer when a bargaining impasse did not
exist; and s 8(a)(3) and (1), id. s 158(a)(3), (1), by permanently
replacing striking employees in an unfair labor practice strike and
refusing to reinstate them immediately when they ended the strike
and unconditionally offered to return to work. See United States
Testing Co., 324 N.L.R.B. 136 (1997).
show the relevance of the claims information, and because the
Board failed to find that the individual claims experience was
confidential and protected from disclosure under Detroit Edi-
son Co. v. NLRB, 440 U.S. 301 (1979). Because we conclude
that the Company's contentions fail, we deny the petition and
grant the Board's cross-application for enforcement of its
order.
I.
The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local
Union 1936 has represented a small unit of technical employ-
ees at the United States Testing Company for over thirty
years. When the Company, a consumer products testing
provider with approximately 85 to 100 employees, experi-
enced an economic downturn, it sought a number of changes
during contract negotiations beginning in August 1995 for a
contract set to expire in October. One change was for the
eleven or so unionized employees to begin making contribu-
tions to their health care costs, in the same amount (thirty
percent) as nonunion employees.
Noting that it previously had rejected similar proposals, the
Union again refused to agree to make contributions and
stated that before it could make counterproposals to meet the
Company's request to reduce health care costs by thirty
percent, it needed certain information: Specifically, the Union
asked the Company to provide the names of the union and
nonunion employees (and their dependents) who participated
in the health plan, the individual claims submitted by each
plan member, and the benefits paid for each claim for the
past eight months. The Company took the position that the
Union did not need, and was not entitled to, the information
concerning nonunion employees.
During the course of negotiations, the Company ultimately
turned over to the Union (1) the premium rate and premium
paid for union employees, (2) a "benefit and service analysis"
consisting of the coverage rates, charges, and adjustments for
medical and dental benefits for all employees, (3) a benefits
cost analysis that the Company had prepared for single and
family coverage, showing the monthly premium and the per-
centage of premiums paid by an employee contributing thirty
percent; (4) the insurance carrier's summary of its experi-
ence monitoring the period of March 1994 through August
1995, including the total claims and premiums paid and the
ratio of the two numbers; (5) a list of the names, premiums,
and claims paid for each union employee; and (6) the total
amounts of premiums and claims paid for union employees,
nonunion employees, and for all employees. What the Compa-
ny did not provide were the individual claims by each member
of the plan (employees and their dependents), showing the
nature of the claims submitted and benefits paid.
The Administrative Law Judge ("ALJ") found that the
information the Company provided to the Union was insuffi-
cient because it did not adequately identify the costs of the
benefits. To the extent that the Company was proposing that
union employees contribute towards the payment of the high
costs of claims by nonunion employees (and their depen-
dents), the ALJ found that the information sought by the
Union was relevant. The Union explained that it sought to
determine what types of claims generated the highest costs;
for that, it needed individual claims information.2 According
to the ALJ, the Union's position was that if most of the large
claims were for surgeries as opposed to physicians' visits and
x-rays, the Union would examine the plan to determine
whether the existing coverage for surgery could be changed
to reduce costs. As an alternative to a thirty-percent contri-
bution, the Union might propose managed care, pre-
admission testing, outpatient surgery, a higher deductible, or
a required co-payment. The ALJ noted that the Company's
explanation in its pretrial affidavit for not providing the
information was simply that the Union had failed to explain
why the individual claims were relevant; the affidavit made
no mention of a concern about privacy. Nevertheless, the
__________
2 At the hearing before the ALJ, the Union explained that its
request did not include information about the individual medical
diagnosis of any plan member (as distinct from the treatment or
service provided), only the amount of the bill for the medical
services and the amount actually paid by the carrier.
ALJ concluded that the Company's bargaining notes reflected
that it had raised a legitimate concern about privacy early in
the negotiations regarding the names of the claimants, which,
if connected with the claim itself, might reveal private medical
information. Therefore, in ordering the Company to turn
over the individual claims information, the ALJ directed that
the names of the claimants not be disclosed.
The Board adopted the ALJ's findings and conclusions.
Based on the information the Company supplied showing that
the claims experience of union and nonunion employees was
quite divergent, the Union was entitled to examine the issue
and thereby justify its position that union employees need not
contribute. Noting that health care costs are clearly a sub-
ject of mandatory bargaining and have become an increasing-
ly important issue as the costs have risen, the Board observed
that the Company
should not have been surprised that the Union was
seeking more than to juggle premium formulas, the role
to which the [Company] wished to confine it, but rather
sought to participate meaningfully in structuring the
benefits for which the [Company] wanted the bargaining
unit to pay. In seeking to play a role in the solution,
rather than simply making a substantial concession on
the [Company's] say-so, the Union was fulfilling its role
as the employees' statutory bargaining representative.
However, as the ALJ found, the names of the individual
claimants were irrelevant and the Board adopted the ALJ's
recommended order denying the Union access to that infor-
mation, clarifying that the Union was entitled to the rest of
the individual claims information without having to renew its
request. In addition to concluding that the Company violated
s 8(a)(5) and (1) by rejecting the Union's request for relevant
information, the Board also concluded that the Company
unlawfully declared an impasse and violated s 8(a)(3) and (1)
by refusing to rehire the striking workers. The Company
challenges all of the Board's findings of unfair labor practices.
II.
The Company contends that the Board erred in two re-
spects in ruling that the Company should have complied with
the Union's request for the medical claims histories of the
nonunion employees and their dependents: first, because its
finding that the Union met its burden to show the relevance
of the claims information is unsupported by the record and,
second, in any event, the information was confidential and
thus protected from disclosure under Detroit Edison. The
Company further contends that the findings that no lawful
impasse existed between the parties, especially given the time
devoted to bargaining and the Union's bad faith, and that the
strike by union employees was an unfair labor practice strike
are unsupported by substantial evidence. Consequently, the
Company contends, it was entitled to implement its final offer
and did not commit unfair labor practices by hiring perma-
nent replacements and refusing to rehire the union employees
engaging in an economic strike.
The court applies the familiar substantial evidence test to
the Board's findings of fact and application of law to the facts,
see NLRB v. United Ins. Co., 390 U.S. 254, 260 (1968);
Universal Camera Corp. v. NLRB, 340 U.S. 474, 488 (1951),
and accords due deference to the reasonable inferences that
the Board draws from the evidence, see Peoples Gas Sys.,
Inc. v. NLRB, 629 F.2d 35, 42 (D.C. Cir. 1980), regardless of
whether the court might have reached a different conclusion
de novo. Universal Camera, 340 U.S. at 488.
The duty to bargain collectively "includes a duty to provide
relevant information needed by a labor union for the proper
performance of its duties as the employees' bargaining repre-
sentative." Detroit Edison, 440 U.S. at 303. In evaluating
an employer's obligation to satisfy a union's request for
information, this Court has long adhered to the view that the
Board is to apply a liberal discovery-type standard, under
which the requested information need only be relevant to the
union in its negotiations. Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers
Local Union No. 6-418 v. NLRB, 711 F.2d 348, 359-60 (D.C.
Cir. 1983) (citations omitted); see General Elec. Co. v. NLRB,
916 F.2d 1163, 1168 (7th Cir. 1990). Relevance is broadly
construed, and in the absence of a countervailing interest, any
requested information that has a bearing on the bargaining
process must be disclosed. Oil, Chemical, 711 F.2d at 359-
60. For information about employees in the bargaining unit,
it is presumed that the requested information is relevant to
the union's negotiations, and the employer must provide the
information unless it can show the information is irrelevant.
Id. at 359; General Elec., 916 F.2d at 1171. By contrast, the
burden is on the union to demonstrate the relevance of
information about nonunion employees. Oil, Chemical, 711
F.2d at 359.
The Company maintains that the only indication the Union
gave during their bargaining sessions for wanting the individ-
ual claims information was to be able to "intelligently and
fairly respond" to the Company's proposal that union employ-
ees contribute thirty percent of the health plan costs. This
bare assertion without further explanation, the Company
maintains, fails to satisfy the Union's burden to show rele-
vance. To the extent the Union envisioned proposals for
increasing employees' co-payments, out-of-pocket expenses,
or raising deductibles, the Company maintains that the Union
could not meet its burden by relying on explanations first
articulated in the hearing before the ALJ; that these expla-
nations were insufficient; that expert evidence showed that
the envisioned counterproposals did not require the Union to
have the requested individual claims information; and that
the Union never expressed any concern about the difference
in the claims experience of union and nonunion employees.
Yet context is everything. The Union's generic statement
requesting the information was made in response to the
Company's proposal for a thirty-percent contribution by Un-
ion employees to the company-wide health insurance plan.
By invoking rising health care costs, the Company necessarily
put on the table the experience under the current plan. It
follows that the Union met its minimal burden of establishing
the relevance of the requested claims and benefits informa-
tion about nonunion employees (and their dependents), who
constituted the overwhelming majority of those covered by
the health plan. Before deciding on a particular response to
the Company's proposed thirty-percent contribution, the Un-
ion needed to know where the heavy claims usage was in
order to formulate intelligent counterproposals; a union offi-
cial testified that this is what he told the Company during
negotiations. The information that the Union received from
the Company showed a significant difference between the
costs to the carrier for nonunion and union employees. By
comparison with 1994, in which the ratio of benefits claimed
to premiums paid for nonunion employees was 6 percent
greater than that for union employees, in 1995, the same ratio
was 79 percent higher for nonunion employees than for union
employees. Further, in 1995 the claims paid to non-union
employees exceeded the premiums they paid, in contrast to
the situation of the union members. In short, the claims
experience for non-union employees was unprofitable for the
Company while the experience for union employees was prof-
itable. With this information, the Union understandably
would want to examine the individual claims and usage expe-
rience of the majority, nonunion, employees.
Thus, the Company's contention that it had insufficient
notice of the potential relevance of the requested information
stems either from its own misunderstanding or from a pre-
conceived notion that the Union's counterproposals could not
include changes to the set of benefits provided under the
current plan. In National Union of Hospital & Health Care
Employees, 248 N.L.R.B. 631 (1980), enforcement granted,
673 F.2d 1314 (4th Cir. 1981), when the Union sought to
increase the employer's contribution to the Union Benefit
Fund and the employer discovered that its contribution ex-
ceeded the costs of benefits to its employees, the employer
sought financial information from the Union about the other
individual employers who were contributing to the Fund.
Although the employer never explicitly explained why all of
the requested information was needed, the Board found that
the Union was sufficiently informed why it was relevant to
the employer's collective-bargaining duty. Id. at 632; see
also NLRB v. Brazos Elec. Power Coop., 615 F.2d 1100, 1101
(5th Cir. 1980); AT&T, 309 N.L.R.B. 925, 928-29 (1992). So
too here the Union adequately informed the Company why it
needed the information; the Company had sufficient notice at
the time of bargaining that the information requested was
needed for, and thus relevant to, the Union's negotiations.
The expert testimony offered by the Company does not
change our conclusion. An insurance underwriter testified to
the effect that the Union's request for individual claims
information was unnecessary to formulate alternative propos-
als. Yet, as the ALJ noted, the underwriter focused on the
Company's current health plan costs and adjustments that
could be made by various cost-shifting arrangements without
additional information. The expert's opinion did not address
whether the individual claims information would be relevant
to formulating a change in the Company's health plan itself,
such as cutting certain benefits or conditioning certain kinds
of coverage. Specifically, the underwriter focused on aggre-
gate costs and benefits information bereft of any data show-
ing individual claims experience that revealed what types of
health care services were used most often and their costs.
Although the ALJ credited the underwriter's testimony that
the claims information sought by the Union was irrelevant to
the impact on the costs of the Company's medical health
insurance plan, the ALJ properly concluded that it was
relevant to the Union's formulation of counterproposals to
reduce health care costs by restructuring parts of the plan.
Insofar as the Company contends that the Board erred in
failing to find that the individual claims information for
nonunion employees was confidential and, therefore, unavail-
able to the Union, the Company attempted neither to redact
the requested information nor to explain why that was not
possible. Yet it has long been established that the employer
has the burden of seeking to accommodate the union's re-
quest for relevant information consistent with other interests
rightfully to be protected. See, e.g., Oil, Chemical, 711 F.2d
at 362; Tritac Corp., 286 N.L.R.B. 522, 522 (1987). An
employer is not relieved of its obligation to turn over relevant
information simply by invoking concerns about confidentiality,
but must offer to accommodate both its concern and its
bargaining obligations, as is often done by making an offer to
release information conditionally or by placing restrictions on
the use of that information. See, e.g., East Tennessee Baptist
Hosp. v. NLRB, 6 F.3d 1139, 1144 (6th Cir. 1993);3 E.W.
Buschman Co. v. NLRB, 820 F.2d 206, 208-09 (6th Cir. 1987);
Safeway Stores, Inc. v. NLRB, 691 F.2d 953, 958 (10th Cir.
1982).
Having made a reasonable accommodation the employer
avoids a Board finding that it violated s 8(a)(5). See, e.g.,
Detroit Edison, 440 U.S. at 319-20; Buschman, 820 F.2d at
209; Soule Glass & Glazing Co. v. NLRB, 652 F.2d 1055,
1098 (1st Cir. 1981), abrogated on other grounds, NLRB v.
Curtin Matheson Scientific, Inc., 494 U.S. 775, 786 n.7, 796
(1990). The rationale for this placement of the burden de-
rives from the interest in allowing the parties to work out
through an informal process how their corresponding duties
and responsibilities can be met. See H.K. Porter Co. v.
NLRB, 397 U.S. 99, 103 (1970); NLRB v. Acme Indus. Co.,
385 U.S. 432, 437-38 (1967); NLRB v. Truitt Mfg. Co., 351
U.S. 149, 152 (1956); Oil, Chemical, 711 F.2d at 358; Florida
Steel Corp. v. NLRB, 601 F.2d 125, 129 (4th Cir. 1979). In
other words, the onus is on the employer because it is in the
__________
3 In East Tennessee, the union requested wage and attendance
records on non-union employees in order to verify that union and
non-union employees were treated equally, as called for in the
parties' collective bargaining agreement. The Hospital raised confi-
dentiality concerns and suggested first, that a mutually agreed upon
certified public accountant be hired to review the wage records and
report if there were any violations of the collective bargaining
agreement, and second, to provide only the records of non-union
employees whom the union could identify as suspected of having
received better treatment with regard to absenteeism. 6 F.3d at
1141, 1142. The Sixth Circuit reversed the Board, concluding that
the Hospital had "offered reasonable alternative solutions which
would have allowed the union to ascertain whether the contracts
were evenly applied while protecting the confidential records of non
uni[on] employees." Id. at 1144-45. Under those circumstances,
the court concluded, "it was incumbent upon the Union to demon-
strate that its need ... outweighed the Hospital's interest in
maintaining the confidentiality of its records: Id. at 1144.
better position to propose how best it can respond to a union
request for information. The union need not propose the
precise alternative to providing the information unedited. Oil
Chemical, 711 F.2d at 362-63; Tritac Corp., 286 N.L.R.B. at
522.
The Company's contention that the Union was not entitled
to the individual claims information of nonunion employees
draws heavily on the protection given to employee privacy
rights by the Supreme Court in Detroit Edison, 440 U.S. 301.
In that case, the union filed a grievance that senior employees
were being bypassed for promotion on the basis of their
scores on a new aptitude test that purportedly measured their
ability to acquire the necessary job skills. Id. at 305. The
union sought the actual test that was administered and the
individual applicants' test papers and scores in order to
evaluate the accuracy and relevancy of the testing system.
Id. at 308. In reversing the Board's order to release the
individual test scores to the union in the absence of the
employees' consent, the Supreme Court emphasized the im-
portance of protecting the privacy of individual employees
who undoubtedly would be sensitive "to disclosure of informa-
tion that may be taken to bear on his or her basic compe-
tence." Id. at 318. In light of the employer's legitimate
interest in preserving confidentiality, the Court concluded
that although the union's request for information was argu-
ably relevant, the employer sufficiently accommodated that
request, and fulfilled its statutory duty to bargain, by offering
to disclose the information upon the employees' written con-
sent. Id. at 318-20.
The Company was undoubtedly correct to raise concerns
about the privacy rights of the non-union employees. See
United States v. Westinghouse Elec. Corp., 638 F.2d 570, 577
(3rd Cir. 1980); cf. Fed. R. Civ. P. 35. The Company,
however, never attempted to redact the requested informa-
tion, and never even claimed that it would be unduly burden-
some or costly to do so. Even now the Company makes no
claim that consent or notice or some other means of protect-
ing employees' privacy rights could not have been achieved.
Indeed, the Company had ready access to the information
that the Union sought, specifically in the form of the insur-
ance carrier's "explanation of benefits" statement listing the
services, the provider of the services, the date rendered, the
total costs, and the amount payable by the carrier in benefits.
Information about health care costs for employees and their
dependents was not, so far as the record reveals, otherwise
available to the Union.
In any event, since the Company made no effort to accom-
modate the Union's request for individual claims information,
by redaction or otherwise, the Board was not required to
decide whether a particular form of accommodation was
sufficient and did not unduly restrict the information that the
Union requested. As ordered by the Board, the confidentiali-
ty of their identities as to specific medical claims is protected.
See Johns-Mansville Sales Corp., 252 N.L.R.B. 368, 368
(1980).
To the extent that the Union sought individual claims
history, the Board likewise could properly find that the
Company rejected the Union's request. The Company's sug-
gestion that the summaries and cost benefit analyses that it
provided somehow reflects the type of accommodation con-
templated by Detroit Edison is unpersuasive. The informa-
tion that the Company provided did not enable the Union to
develop alternative proposals other than those in the nature
of the Company's proposal for a percentage-cost contribution.
Nothing required the Union to confine its thinking on cutting
the Company's health care costs to the current plan, and to
the extent the Company attempted to do so, it was interfering
with the Union's ability to fulfill its responsibility to represent
its members' interests in bargaining. See Nat'l Union of
Hospital & Health Care Employees, 248 N.L.R.B. at 633.
In light of the foregoing, this court can quickly dispose of
the Company's other contentions. Its unlawful refusal to
supply the requested medical claims information precluded
the Company from declaring an impasse. See, e.g., NLRB v.
Palomar Corp. 465 F.2d 731, 734-35 (5th Cir. 1972); Cone
Mills Corp. v. NLRB, 413 F.2d 445, 449-50 (4th Cir. 1969).
Because no genuine impasse was reached, the Company could
not lawfully implement the terms of its final offer. See, e.g.,
NLRB v. Katz, 369 U.S. 736, 741-42 (1962); Palomar, 465
F.2d at 734-35; Cone Mills, 413 F.2d at 449-50. Therefore,
the union employees' refusal to return to work under the
terms of the Company's final offer constituted an unfair labor
practice strike rather than an economic strike. See, e.g.,
NLRB v. Int'l Van Lines, 409 U.S. 48, 50-51 (1972); General
Indus. Employees Union, Local 42 v. NLRB, 951 F.2d 1308,
1311 (D.C. Cir. 1991).
Accordingly, we deny the petition and grant the Board's
cross-application for enforcement of its order of October 29,
1997.
Sentelle, Circuit Judge, dissenting: I do not quarrel with
the majority's basic statement of the facts. I restate a few
for emphasis.
In the course of contract negotiations, the International
Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local Union 1936 ("the
Union") sought disclosure of claims information concerning
the health benefit plan of petitioner United States Testing
Company. As the majority recognizes:
[T]he Company ultimately turned over to the Union (1)
the premium rate and premium paid for union employ-
ees, (2) a "benefit and service analysis" consisting of the
coverage rates, charges, and adjustments for medical and
dental benefits for all employees, (3) a benefits cost
analysis that the Company had prepared for single and
family coverage, showing the monthly premium and the
percentage of premiums paid by an employee contribut-
ing thirty per cent; (4) the insurance carrier's summary
of its experience monitoring the period of March 1994
through August 1995, including the total claims and
premiums paid and ratio of the two numbers; (5) a list of
the names, premiums, and claims paid for each union
employee; and (6) the total amounts of premiums and
claims paid for union employees, nonunion employees,
and for all employees.
Maj. Op. at 3-4.
The only thing that the Union wanted that the petitioner
did not turn over was the individual claims made by nonunion
individual employees and their dependents, showing the na-
ture of the claims submitted and the benefits paid. The only
showing of relevance that the Union made for the demand for
this personal information was the insistence that it needed it
to be able to "intelligently and fairly" respond to the proposal
by petitioner that Union employees contribute thirty percent
of the health plan costs. Indeed, the majority acknowledges
that "the employer never explicitly explained why all of the
requested information was needed." Id. at 8. Nevertheless,
the majority maintains that the company was required to
divine the relevance of the requested information from the
"context" of the negotiations. Id. at 7. Such a requirement
is inconsistent even with the liberal "discovery-type standard"
used in determining relevance since the Union had the bur-
den of demonstrating the relevance of information relating to
nonunion employees. See Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers
Local Union No. 6-418 v. NLRB, 711 F.2d 348, 359 (D.C. Cir.
1983).
I emphasize again that it claimed to need this information
in addition to the six categories of information the company
had already provided. For this failing, the company, not the
Union, was cited for and found guilty of an unfair labor
practice by the National Labor Relations Board. The court
upholds that Board decision.
As the majority recognizes, the Supreme Court has afford-
ed to management the right to protect the privacy interests of
its employees in complying with Union demands even for
relevant information. Detroit Edison Co. v. NLRB, 440 U.S.
301 (1979). Assuming that the Union's minimum showing of
relevance in the present case is sufficient, I fail to see how
the privacy interest could be much higher than we have
before us in the case today. The Union, armed with its
generic desire to "intelligently" represent its members, de-
mands the individualized detail on the medical history of the
nonunion workers whom it neither does nor can represent.
The majority faults the petitioner for not furnishing the
information in a redacted form, but neither the majority nor
the Board explains why the six categories of information
furnished are not at least the functional equivalent of redact-
ed claims so far as relevance to negotiation is concerned nor
explains how redaction would be adequate protection for the
privacy of employees in a workforce no greater than 200 in
number in which identity might well be surmised by even
redacted medical data. As in the case of relevance, I would
place the burden of proof concerning the adequacy of the
company's accommodation on the Union. Where a company
has "raised its concern over the confidentiality of the records
involved," it becomes "incumbent upon the Union to demon-
strate that its need for the materials outweighed the [compa-
ny's] interest in maintaining the confidentiality of the rec-
ords." East Tennessee Baptist Hosp. v. NLRB, 6 F.3d 1139,
1144 (6th Cir. 1996). Here, the Union has not come close to
meeting its burden of proof.
Indeed, even if the burden of proof were on the company, I
would still hold that the company adequately accommodated
the Union's request. In order to address confidentiality
concerns, the company merely refused to provide the Union
with the information in the form and manner it demanded.
Instead of providing individual claims data for the nonunion
employees, the company provided a wealth of claims informa-
tion, including the aggregate "total claims and premiums
paid" for nonunion employees. Yet, a "refusal to disclose the
requested record in the form and manner demanded by the
Union" does not constitute a failure to bargain. Id. at 1143-
44. Moreover, the Union itself was unyielding in its demands
and proposed no accommodations that might be agreeable to
both parties. The Union did not even propose the accommo-
dation ultimately implemented by the NLRB order--redac-
tion of the names on individual claims. Therefore, under the
circumstances, the company's attempts to accommodate the
Union, far from being nonexistent as the majority suggests,
were more than adequate.
In sum, the majority fails to grasp the significance of the
privacy interests at stake in this case and to appreciate the
lengths to which the company went to provide the Union with
the information it requested while protecting the privacy of
nonunion employees. As in Detroit Edison, in the instant
case there is a "total absence of evidence that the [company]
fabricated concern for employee confidentiality only to frus-
trate the Union in the discharge of its responsibilities." 440
U.S. at 319-20. Therefore, I would grant the petition for
review.