IFPTE Requests House and Senate NDAA Conferees Include Union Priorities in Compromise Bill
Ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday, IFPTE sent a formal request to Senators and Representatives on the conference committee for the National Defense Authorization Act of 2024 (NDAA).
The conferees are responsible for agreeing to a compromise bill that reconciles differences in the separate NDAA bills that the House and Senate passed earlier this year.
The NDAA is an annual bill that provides the resources, policy, and authorizations necessary to preserve and enhance our military readiness, support DOD civilian employees, and workers in the private sector aerospace and defense industry.
IFPTE's letter to NDAA conferees asked for the compromise bill to include policy directing the Navy to "recommend policy and legislative remedies to make sure that DoD employees and their dependents have quality healthcare services and timely access to care" when stationed in Japan and elsewhere in the Pacific; statutory procurement requirements to increase domestic content for major defense programs to 75% by 2029 and to increase domestic content for Navy shipbuilding to 100% by 2033; and, allow newly hired federal employees who have military service to be immediately eligible for family and medical leave.
IFPTE also asked NDAA conferees to not include provisions that eliminate Department of Defense initiatives on diversity, which would only harm undermine service members and their families, DOD civilian employees, and military readiness.
The letter also notes IFPTE's disappointment that language to allow veterans to receive concurrent retirement pay and disability compensation was not included in the NDAA, despite overwhelming popular support for it. IFPTE also noted the disappointment that the NDAA is increasingly extending out direct hiring authorities at DOD, instead of addressing recruitment and retention through policies that support competitive hiring for qualified candidates.