peter-robb-new-nlrb-general-counsel

Peter Robb, new NLRB General Counsel

Peter Robb has been confirmed as general counsel of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), becoming the gatekeeper who decides which cases the board hears. Pro-business attorney Robb replaces Richard Griffith, a pro-labor Obama appointee whose term expired with the witching hour on Halloween.

Robb was confirmed Nov. 8 along a party-line vote of 49-46, and he will join an NLRB that is in Republican hands, 3-2, for the first time since George W. Bush was president.

According to the law firm Downs Rachlin Martin PLLC (DRM), where Robb worked, ” His litigation experience includes defending employers from unfair labor practice charges, age and sex discrimination charges, class action age claims, and wage/hour claims as well as bringing suits against labor organizations. ”

“Robb’s nomination and confirmation would set the stage for the board to reverse many of the pro-labor rulings issued by the Obama board,” lawyers from the management-focused firm Jackson Lewis wrote in a blog post in August.

Robb earned a B.A. in economics from Georgetown University and a J.D. from the University of Maryland School of Law.

The NLRB is an independent federal agency enforcing the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), which guarantees the right of most private sector employees to organize, to engage in group efforts to improve their wages and working conditions, to determine whether to have unions as their bargaining representative, to engage in collective bargaining, and to refrain from any of these activities. It acts to prevent and remedy unfair labor practices committed by private sector employers and unions.

Congress enacted the National Labor Relations Act in 1935 to protect the rights of employees and employers, to encourage collective bargaining, and to curtail certain private sector labor and management practices, which can harm the general welfare of workers, businesses and the U.S. economy.