STATE OF NEW JERSEY
220th LEGISLATURE
PRE-FILED FOR INTRODUCTION IN THE 2022 SESSION
Sponsored by:
Senator JOSEPH P. CRYAN
District 20 (Union)
SYNOPSIS
Provides certain protections and rights for temporary laborers.
CURRENT VERSION OF TEXT
Introduced Pending Technical Review by Legislative Counsel.
An Act concerning employment and protection of temporary laborers, supplementing Title 34 of the Revised Statutes, and amending P.L.1989, c.331.
Be It Enacted by the Senate and General Assembly of the State of New Jersey:
1. (New section) The Legislature finds and declares:
a. At least 127,000 individuals work for temporary help service firms, sometimes referred to as temp agencies or staffing agencies, in New Jersey. Approximately 100 temporary help service firms with several branch offices are licensed throughout the State. Moreover, there are a large, though unknown, number of unlicensed temporary help service firms that operate outside the purview of law enforcement.
b. Recent national data indicate that the share of Black and Latino temporary and staffing workers far outstrips their proportion of the workforce in general. In addition to a heavy concentration in service occupations, temporary laborers are heavily concentrated in the production, transportation, and material moving occupations and manufacturing industries. Further, full-time temporary help service firm workers earn 41 percent less than workers in traditional work arrangements, and these workers are far less likely than other workers to receive employer-sponsored retirement and health benefits.
c. Recent studies and a survey of low-wage temporary laborers themselves find that, generally, these workers are particularly vulnerable to abuse of their labor rights, including unpaid wages, failure to pay for all hours worked, minimum wage and overtime violations, unsafe working conditions, unlawful deductions from pay for meals, transportation, equipment, and other items, as well as discriminatory practices.
d. This act is intended to further protect the labor and employment rights of these workers.
2. (New section) As used in P.L. , c. (C. ) (pending before the Legislature as this bill):
Commissioner means Commissioner of Labor and Workforce Development, or a designee of the commissioner.
Employ means to suffer or permit to work for compensation, including by means of ongoing, contractual relationships in which the employer retains substantial direct or indirect control over the employee's employment opportunities or terms and conditions of employment.
Employer means any person or corporation, partnership, individual proprietorship, joint venture, firm, company, or other similar legal entity who engages the services of an employee and who pays the employees wages, salary, or other compensation, or any person acting directly or indirectly in the interest of an employer in relation to an employee.
Hours worked means all of the time that the employee is required to be at the employees place of work or on duty. Nothing in P.L. , c. (C. ) (pending before the Legislature as this bill) requires an employer to pay an employee for hours the employee is not required to be at the employees place of work because of holidays, vacation, lunch hours, illness, and similar reasons.
Person means any natural person or their legal representative, partnership, corporation, company, trust, business entity, or association, and any agent, employee, salesman, partner, officer, director, member, stockholder, associate, trustee, or beneficiary of a trust thereof.
Temporary laborer means a person who contracts for employment with a temporary help service firm.
Temporary labor applicant means a person who requests a job assignment through a temporary help service firm, whether in the presence of the firm, in writing, or through an online application process.
Temporary labor means work performed by a temporary laborer at the business of, or for, a third party client of a temporary help service firm, the duration of which may be specific or undefined, pursuant to a contract or understanding between the temporary help service firm and the third party client.
Temporary help service firm means any person or entity who operates a business which consists of employing individuals directly or indirectly for the purpose of assigning the employed individuals to assist the firm's customers in the handling of the customers' temporary, excess or special work loads, and who, in addition to the payment of wages or salaries to the employed individuals, pays federal social security taxes and State and federal unemployment insurance; carries workers compensation insurance as required by State law; and sustains responsibility for the actions of the employed individuals while they render services to the firm's customers. A temporary help service firm is required to comply with the provisions of P.L.1960, c. 39 (C.56:8-1 et seq.).
Third party client means any person who contracts with a temporary help service firm for obtaining temporary laborers.
3. (New section) a. Whenever a temporary help service firm agrees to send a person to work as a temporary laborer, the temporary help service firm shall provide the temporary laborer, at the time of dispatch, a statement, in writing in English and in the language identified by the employee as the employees primary language, containing the following items on a form approved by the commissioner:
(1) the name of the temporary laborer;
(2) the name, address, and telephone number of:
(a) the temporary help service firm, or the contact information of the firms agent facilitating the placement;
(b) its workers compensation carrier;
(c) the worksite employer or third party client; and
(d) the Department of Labor and Workforce Development;
(3) the name and nature of the work to be performed;
(4) the wages offered;
(5) the name and address of the assigned worksite of each temporary laborer;
(6) the terms of transportation offered to the temporary laborer;
(7) a description of the position and whether it shall require any special clothing, protective equipment, and training, and what training and clothing will be provided by the temporary help service firm or the third party client; and any licenses and any costs charged to the employee for supplies or training;
(8) whether a meal or equipment, or both, are provided, either by the temporary help service firm or the third party client, and the cost of the meal and equipment, if any;
(9) for multi-day assignments, the schedule;
(10) the length of the assignment; and
(11) the amount of sick leave to which temporary workers are entitled under the P.L.2018, c.10 (C.34:11D-1 et seq.), and the terms of its use.
In the event of a change in the schedule, shift, or location of an assignment for a multi-day assignment of a temporary laborer, the temporary help service firm shall provide written notice of the change not less than 48 hours in advance to the temporary laborer, when possible. The temporary help service firm shall bear the burden of showing that it was not possible to provide the required notice.
If a temporary laborer is assigned to the same assignment for more than one day, the temporary help service firm shall be required to provide the employment notice only on the first day of the assignment and on any day that any of the terms listed on the emp