Panel Urges Loosening of Union Laws : Workplace: Bipartisan group’s long-awaited recommendations on labor policy leaves both sides dissatisfied.

WASHINGTON —  The Clinton Administration’s special commission on labor policy issued a long-awaited report Monday recommending new laws making it easier for workers to organize unions.

But the report falls far short of the high expectations that union leaders had when the commission, headed by former Labor Secretary John Dunlop, was set up nearly two years ago.

On the other hand, the Labor Policy Assn., which represents human resource executives of 225 major corporations, complained that the commission focused on strengthening union organizing rather than pointing “the way towards increased employer-employee cooperation.”

The commission recommended that the National Labor Relations Board should speed up the time it takes for employees to form a union. It also called for statutes requiring the NLRB to obtain injunctions quickly to stop discrimination by employers against union members.

Other recommendations include a call for legislation to ease formation of company-sanctioned worker involvement programs.

The panel urged clarification of labor laws to ensure that employee participation programs are not unlawful simply because they involve discussion of work conditions or pay--”as long as such discussion is incidental to the broad purposes of these programs.”

But the report says the programs, some of which have been found by regulators to be illegal “company unions,” should not be allowed to replace independent worker unions.

The report also calls for a clear definition of the term employee to halt the current business trend of hiring independent contractors in order to avoid having to provide benefits.

Union leaders expressed disappointment in the report, saying it fails to address widening earnings disparities and stagnant wages.

The concerns echo those of Labor Secretary Robert B. Reich, who referred last week to an “anxious class” of American workers whose economic fortunes were falling behind.

While the commission acknowledged these problems in its report, it said their solution lies well beyond its mandate.

The hopes of organized labor had risen last year when the Dunlop Commission issued its interim “fact-finding” report, identifying wage gaps as a major cause for concern.

“The (final) report just doesn’t address those concerns,” the union official said.

Dunlop was labor secretary under former President Gerald Ford. He was joined on the commission by two other former labor secretaries, W.J. Usery and Ray Marshall, and former Commerce Secretary Juanita Kreps.

Also on the panel were Xerox Corp. Chairman Paul Allaire, Standard Technology Inc. Chief Executive Kathryn Turner and former United Auto Workers President Douglas Fraser.