The New Haven ambulance company that fired an employee after she criticized her supervisor on Facebook agreed to settle a case brought by the U.S. National Labor Relations Board, Bloomberg News reports.
The NLRB announced the agreement Monday, resolving an Oct. 27 complaint against American Medical Response of Connecticut Inc. that said Dawnmarie Souza was illegally fired and denied union representation. The employee had posted comments on her Facebook Inc. Internet account.
Among the issues in the case was whether a worker has the right to criticize a boss on a site such as Facebook if co- workers add comments. The case was the first by the NLRB to assert that employers break the law by disciplining workers who post criticisms on social-networking websites.
“There’s a strong argument that social networks are like a public forum, an invitation to conversation,” said Marshall B. Babson, a lawyer who served on the NLRB during the Reagan administration. He is a partner with Hughes Hubbard & Reed LLP in New York.
Under the settlement, American Medical Response will revise its “overly broad rules” to ensure that they don’t improperly restrict employees from discussing wages, hours and working conditions with co-workers and others while not at work, and that they wouldn’t discipline or discharge employees for engaging in such discussions, the NLRB said in a statement.
The company promised that employee requests for union representation when meeting with managers won’t be denied in the future, and that employees won’t be threatened with discipline for requesting union representation, according to the agency.
