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No . ~8 Sbamended. Further, the Board is duty constituted by Agreement, has jurisdiction of the Parties and of the subject matter, and the Parties to this dispute were given due notice of the hearing thereon.
As is evident by the Statement of Claim, the parties have combined two disciplinary incidents concerning the same employee and held the investigations back to back.
Both cases involved the actions of or the Inactions of Claimant Roves. In the first case, Claimant was assessed a record suspension of 10-days, and in the second case the charges were insubordination.
The Board destres to propose one Award involving both incidents but finds it cannot.
The first discussion Involves the case as outlined in item 1 of the Statement of Claim. In this case, there exists no controversy. Claimant was candid, calm and readily admitted to the violations, A 10-day record suspension is extremely light, but a review of Claimant's disciplinary record shows one letter of appreciation, then this incident. That is alt there is to his record as of the first case. Consideration has to be given to the letter of commendation just as other incidents of discipline. Such letters cannot be used to offset serious cases, but In minor cases such as ham concerned it does have an Impact, The 10-day record suspension Is to be removed from his record in its entirety. This Is so because of 27 years seniority without any other disciplinary action plus the letter of appreciation, and the manner he conducted himself was candid and cooperative moves this Board to sustain the clakn.
Claimant's facial hair exceed the maximum allowed when It becomes necessary to wear a respirator.
Ciaimanft insubordination charge comes from being ordered to shave his board. He, for his own reasons, did not. in fact, he was even sent home for not reducing the facial hair to a minimum before this incident that would not invalidate the protection afforded by the respirator.
It developed that once a year Claimant and others doing the welding work were required to take a face mask test At these sessions, Claimant admitted he carne cleanly shaved, but apparently In this Instance he die! not think it necessary.
There was also a defense of Claimant keeping a razor in his truck should he be called off his regular scheduled work where a respirator was not required to do work where respirators were required, but this was not acceptable to the Carrier.
The Carrier did Instruct Claimant to appear either clean shaven or have his facial hair at a minimum; a small goatee and upper lip hair.
Claimant was emotional about the instructions and did put up an argument, but it was an argument he lost.
To do welding on the Carrier In certain Incidents, employs" must be prepared to don a respirator and the respirator must function property. Claimant was In the wrong. He must now realize he Is not Immune to the use of protective gear the Carrier supplies.
Again, the 34-day record suspension and a one year probationary is reduced to a it)-day record suspension with no probationary period.