Arbitration of Employee Drug Abuse Cases - An Arbitrator's Perspective (From Arbitration Promise and Performance, P 90-100, 1984, James L Stern and Barbara D Dennis, ed. - See NCJ-94688)

• NCJ Number: 94691
• Author(s): T S Denenberg
• Date Published: 1984
• Length: 11 pages
• Sale Source: Bureau of National Affairs
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

Arbitrators will increasingly be called upon to decide discipline and discharge cases involving employee drug abuse. The discussion reviews several issues these cases are likely to pose: whether drug abuse should be treated differently than alcohol abuse; to what extent the legal status of a drug should affect the outcome of an arbitration; identification of drugs and the high security workplace; and condoning cocaine.

Abstract

At least two arbitrators believe that drug and alcohol abusers must be treated substantially equally, even when the employer prefers to distinguish between the two types of offenses. If safety and productivity are jeopardized more by legal than by illegal substances, then employment rules that deal more harshly with abusers of illegal drugs than abusers of prescription drugs may require reexamination. Arbitrators might consider whether in some circumstances the charge of abusing an unspecified substance may be so vague as to deny the grievant due process. To the extent that employers heed advice to expand surveillance, search, and screening measures, arbitrators will be called upon to help set the delicate balance between personal rights and the need for a workplace free of substance abuse. Soon arbitrators may be asked to decide whether some employers have condoned employee drug use. The arbitrator is most likely to face the issue in a case involving cocaine. Reviewing the hundreds of alcohol and drug arbitrations that have been reported in the last three decades leads to the suggestion for a joint management-labor approach to substance abuse -- preferably through the collective bargaining agreement.