Tuesday, December 23, 2008

Obama Labor Appointee Vows to Bolster Unions, Enforcement, Training

Workforce Management
December 19, 2008

President-elect Barack Obama’s nominee for secretary of labor promised to bolster unions, workforce training and the agency’s enforcement of pay rules when she was introduced at a Chicago press conference on Friday, December 19.
Obama has tapped Rep. Hilda Solis, D-California, to helm the Department of Labor, one of four appointments he made Friday. He also announced his choices for secretary of transportation, U.S. trade representative and head of the Small Business Administration.
In her fourth term representing parts of Los Angeles and outlying areas of the city, Solis is the third Hispanic that Obama has chosen for a Cabinet position. He said that she “has been a champion of our middle class” and “an advocate for everyday people.”
Obama asserted that Solis would turn around what he called a wayward agency.
“For the past eight years, the Department of Labor has not lived up to its role either as an advocate for hardworking families or as an arbitrator of fairness in relations between labor and management,” Obama said. “That will change when Hilda Solis is secretary of labor. Under her leadership, I am confident that the Department of Labor will once again stand up for working families.”

Full Story: http://www.workforce.com/section/00/article/26/05/02.php

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