NSPS Officially Repealed as President Obama Signs Defense Bill

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Randy Erwin, Legislative Director
Phone: (202) 257-0948

Today, President Obama signed the 2010 National Defense Authorization Act.  Included in the bill was a provision to repeal the controversial National Security Personnel System (NSPS).  The bill also contained several small provisions impacting retirement benefits for the federal workforce.  

The National Federation of Federal Employees, a union representing 100,000 federal employees nationwide, including 50,000 in the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), praise President Obama and Congress for their support of this legislation, including the bold decision to repeal NSPS.

“We applaud President Obama and Congress for their bold decision to repeal this anti-worker personnel system,” said William R. Dougan, National President of the National Federation of Federal Employees. “This shows that they are seriously committed to building a stronger, more just federal workplace in DoD.”

The NSPS provisions in the bill dictate a repeal of the system, and a conversion of the over 200,000 covered employees back into existing pay systems by January 1, 2012.  NSPS workers will be guaranteed the full annual GS pay adjustment over the transitional period.

Also included in the Defense Bill are provisions offering employees enrolled in the Federal Employee Retirement System (FERS) credit for their unused sick leave upon retirement, and extending locality pay to workers stationed outside of the mainland United States – both critical NFFE priorities.

“We are pleased to see that these crucial federal pay and retirement benefits have finally been extended to everyone in the federal workforce,” said Dougan. “These are just common sense policies that are really going to make a difference for employee morale and the performance of federal agencies.”

The most important development, however, is undoubtedly the demise of NSPS. NFFE and its sister unions in the federal sector have fought vigorously for over six years to bring an end to the anti-union, anti-worker personnel system. Now that the system is repealed, both federal employees and their unions can breathe a sigh of relief.

“We had to pull out all the stops in this NSPS fight because we knew that we were fighting for our very existence” said Dougan.  “NSPS is clearly an unjust system.  This system has harbored discriminatory pay practices and it is the least transparent pay system we have ever seen. We knew we had to beat it, and today we finally did.  This is a proud day for NFFE and our membership.”