Citing heightened national security and other concerns, the National Labor Relations Board has stripped nonunion employees of the right to bring a co-worker along with them to meetings with the boss that could lead to a disciplinary action against the employee.

The board, in a 3-2 decision made public this week, reversed a controversial ruling made in 2000 that gave nonunion workers so-called Weingarten rights that have been held by union workers since 1975.

It was the fourth time since 1983 that the board has changed positions on the issue of whether Weingarten rights should be limited to those employees who are represented by a union.

In overruling the 4-year-old decision involving the Epilepsy Foundation of Northeast Ohio, a board majority led by Chairman Robert J. Battista said both positions were permissible interpretations of the National Labor Relations Act. But they said overturning the existing precedent would best serve national labor relations policy.

The opinion by Battista and board member Ronald Meisburg cited a "rise in the need for investigatory interviews" in response to new security concerns raised by terrorist attacks and new statutes governing such workplace issues as discrimination and sexual harassment. Board member Peter Schaumber agreed with their opinion.

"We are especially cognizant of the rise in the number of instances of workplace violence, as well as the increase in the number of instances of corporate abuse and fiduciary lapses,'' the majority wrote. "Further, because of the events of Sept. 11, 2001, and their aftermath, we must now take into account the presence of both real and threatened terrorist attacks.''

Sluffing off criticism by dissenting board members Wilma Liebman and Dennis Walsh, Battista's decision denied that the majority intends to turn the American workplace into a "new front in the war on terrorism."

"We simply observe that some employers, faced with security concerns that are an outgrowth of the troubled times in which we live, may seek to question employees on a private basis for a host of legitimate reasons," the majority wrote.

"Those employers start no war, and the board does not encourage them, or discourage them, from having such private inquiries. The board simply refrains from forbidding employers to hold such private inquiries."

The new decision came in a case involving IBM Corp., which had denied a request by three employees to have a co-worker present during in interviews regarding harassment complaints made by a contract worker. The three eventually were fired and filed unfair labor charges over the denial.

An NLRB judge had found that IBM violated the National Labor Relations Act by denying the requests. IBM then urged the full board to overturn the Epilepsy Foundation ruling.