SEIU keeps Kaiser workers in second showdown with Calif. rival

The upstart National Union of Healthcare Workers failed for a second time to win the prize of representing 45,000 workers at Kaiser Permanente hospitals in California.

In a do-over election ordered after NUHW disputed the results three years ago, the incumbent SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West retained representation rights. On Thursday the National Labor Relations Board tallied 18,894 votes for SEIU and 13,002 votes for NUHW, according to a NUHW news release, while 334 voted for neither union. The unions have a seven-day period to challenge the results.

The election was seen as in important test of strength for NUHW, which has ambitions of becoming a national foil to SEIU, the dominant organizing force in U.S. hospitals, nursing homes and home care.

After the first showdown in October 2010, NUHW challenged alleged that Kaiser threatened workers who wanted to vote for NUHW by saying they would withhold raises and other benefits. NLRB officials in 2011 ruled those complaints were valid and ordered the new election. It wasn't until February that the NLRB set the date for this second election, which took place over the course of last month via mailed ballots sent to the NLRB office in Oakland.

NLRB officials said it was the largest mail ballot election in the board's history, besting the vote count in the October 2010 election.

NUHW—which formed when a group of disgruntled members left SEIU—consists of about 10,000 members, including 4,000 at Kaiser facilities who won't be affected by the election. NUHW leaders argue that SEIU has been too cooperative with Kaiser's management. Earlier this year NUWH formally allied with the California Nurses Association, one of the more aggressive unions in the country.

Follow Ashok Selvam on Twitter: @MH_aselvam