Members of Congress are calling on Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to withdraw a proposed new labor system that they say would hurt the collective bargaining rights of thousands of civilian workers.

Democratic Rep. Tom Allen of Maine joined Republicans and Democrats in Congress last week in a letter to Rumsfeld criticizing the new National Security Personnel System. He pointed out that the proposal would affect 700,000 civilian employees, including thousands based at Portsmouth Naval Station in Kittery and Brunswick Naval Air Station.

The 13-page proposal describing the new system on labor management rule changes was released in February. If implemented, it would make it harder for employees to join bargaining units and easier for them to drop out. Third-party reviews of employees’ appeals and union grievances would be replaced with in-house reviews.

Paul O’Connor, president of the Metal Trades Department of the AFL-CIO at the Portsmouth Naval Station, said the proposed changes would affect 4,500 workers on the base.

“It is an insult. It is a slap in the face of every worker out here whose rights will be taken away,” O’Connor said.

Members of Congress said the system would undermine the duty of unions and management to bargain in good faith. They also estimate that as many as 200,000 civilian employees could lose their right to join unions under the proposal. Congress in November last year passed the National Defense Authorization Act that authorized the Department of Defense to change personnel, pay and labor management rules for its civilian work force.

But Allen said the department now was making a “backdoor attempt” to take away civil service protections. “The Department of Defense’s proposal goes far beyond what a bipartisan majority in Congress clearly intended when we passed the NDAA. Our letter is a demonstration of our determination to reverse its action and replace it with a system that recognizes the challenges of the department’s national security mission while protecting the rights of our civilian work force,” Allen said.

In their letter, members of Congress urged the department to withdraw its proposal and submit a new one consistent with the intent of Congress when it passed the NDAA.

“In hearings that preceded the passage of the NDAA, DOD officials repeatedly stated that they were not trying to eliminate collective bargaining rights. A majority of House members from both parties voted for the bill with the assurance that fundamental labor rights would be protected. Thus, we were very troubled to learn that DOD has submitted a proposal for a new labor relations system that abrogates these rights and goes well beyond what Congress intended in the NDAA,” the letter says.

The objections so far have had no impact. On Friday, a Department of Defense official said the department still was “actively engaged in the development of” the new system. The official said the department was “committed to designing a new personnel management system to support” its national security mission “while treating workers fairly and protecting their rights. … Secretary Rumsfeld has directed the implementation of [the National Security Personnel System] to be inclusive and comprehensive.”

One of the elements of the Department of Defense proposal calls for national collective bargaining instead of local bargaining. Officials say the new system also will make it easier for them to transfer thousands of jobs now done by members of the military to civilians, freeing the troops to focus on war efforts.

O’Connor said it hurt workers to be told that they could be interfering with national security. He added that the proposal could have only a chain of negative outcomes.

“When you take the voice away from the people, you have disgruntled employees and a debilitated work force,” he said.

Meanwhile, in an April 2 letter, officials from the Department of Defense sought to alleviate any fears among civilian employees through an open letter. The letter, signed by David S.C. Chu, undersecretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness, and Gordon England, secretary of the Navy, said they were “determined to take the time necessary to do the job right.”

“As we refine the [National Security Personnel System], the procedures and concepts will likely change over time. During this period of collaboration, you will have a variety of means by which to get information about NSPS,” they said in the letter.