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Stop Abusive Conduct in the Workplace: Sponsor the Healthy Workplace Bill!
  1. Signatures
    106 out of 200
    Petitioning
    1. The Governor of AZ (+ 2 others)
      Petitioning
      close
      • The Governor of AZ
      • The AZ State Senate
      • The AZ State House
  2. Created By
    Carlos Rivera
    Dunedin, New Zealand
About this Petition Petition Letter Petition Updates

 

Workplace Bullying is repeated, health-harming mistreatment of one or more persons (the targets) by one or more perpetrators that takes one or more of the following forms:

  • Verbal abuse.
  • Offensive conduct/behaviors (including nonverbal) which are threatening, humiliating or intimidating
  • Work interference – sabotage – which prevents work from getting done.

What the HWB Does for Employers

  • Precisely defines an "abusive work environment" -- it is a high standard for misconduct
  • Requires proof of health harm by licensed health or mental health professionals
  • Protects conscientious employers from vicarious liability risk when internal correction and prevention mechanisms are in effect
  • Gives employers the reason to terminate or sanction offenders
  • Requires plaintiffs to use private attorneys
  • Plugs the gaps in current state and federal civil rights protections

What the HWB Does for Workers

  • Provides an avenue for legal redress for health harming cruelty at work
  • Allows you to sue the bully as an individual
  • Holds the employer accountable
  • Seeks restoration of lost wages and benefits
  • Compels employers to prevent and correct future instances

What the HWB Does Not Do

  • Involve state agencies to enforce any provisions of the law
  • Incur costs for adopting states
  • Require plaintiffs to be members of protected status groups (it is "status-blind")
  • Use the term "workplace bullying"
  • http://www.healthyworkplacebill.org/bill.php

This petition is sponsored by the Arizona Healthy Workplace Advocates: arizhwa@gmail.com

Why People Are Signing
Recent Signatures

Sponsor a Healthy Workplace Bill in Arizona

Greetings from Arizona Healthy Workplace Advocates:

The psychological and physical health of American workers is put at risk everyday by a growing problem: abusive conduct (bullying) in the workplace. The economic health of businesses is put at risk everyday because employers have few tools to cope with the problem.

Groups lobbying on behalf of U.S. employers (none is bigger than the Chamber of Commerce) won't admit that workplace bullying hurts the economy and the businesses they businesses they represent. But they can no longer claim that workplace bullying does is non-existent. The 2007 and 2010 WBI-Zogby survey results put that issue to rest. However, they do claim that the problem is best dealt with on a voluntary basis. These groups believe we should let employers handle their own internal affairs, because they know what is best. Sadly, when there is no external pressure to do the right thing for workers, most employers won't. We need a HEALTHY WORKPLACE BILL that introduces a private right of action for plaintiffs whose health is harmed by malicious, intentional bullying that a reasonable person would recognize as abusive conduct. http://www.healthyworkplacebill.org/bill.php

The 2007 WBI-Zogby survey results shed light. When employers are told about the bullying in their organizations, nearly half (44%) do nothing, while 18% actually worsen the situation by retaliating against the individual(s) who reported it.

Employers know how to comply with laws. Sexual harassment and racial discrimination claims lead to investigations and pressure to stop only because state and federal laws compel employers to pay attention to such complaints. Employers did not voluntarily decide to curb harassment for the sake of workers' health and dignity. Laws made them do it. Because of the laws, business and worker conditions actually improved!

There is no cost to taxpayers to enact the Healthy Workplace Bill. It is a bipartisan bill, supportered by Republican, Democratic, Independent and Third Party voters.

The HWB has been introduced in 20 states, in over 60 versions, and has been sponsored by more than 300 legislators, thanks to the State Coordinator volunteer network directed by Dr. Gary Namie. The bill has successfully passed committee votes in Illinois, Washington, New York, and Connecticut; passed House floor votes in New York for a study-only bill; and passed both houses in Illinois as a Joint Resolution, establishing funding for a 1-year Task Force on Workplace Bullying. In 2010, the Senates in both the New York and Illinois legislatures passed the bill. We await the successful passage by floor vote in both chambers. Eventually, it will become law in one or more states and be replicated like the school bullying laws that snowball across our nation.

Discussions about a federal law were begun in 2010 with members of the U. S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate.

arizhwa@gmail.com

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