Porter

This appeal, from an order of the superior court denying a petition for writ of mandate, poses a perplexing and apparently novel question concerning the relationship between state labor standards of general application and the provisions of a collective bargaining agreement. Labor Code section 1182 empowers the Industrial Welfare Commission to establish minimum wages for all employees, and Labor Code section 450 provides that “[n]o employer, or agent or officer thereof, or other person, shall compel or coerce any employee, or applicant for employment, to patronize his employer, or any other person, in the purchase of anything of value.” The two sections, read together, have been interpreted to prohibit an employer in the restaurant business from requiring employees to accept meals in the employer’s establishment as part of their minimum wage, absent “specific and prior voluntary employee consent.” (California State Restaurant Assn. v. Whitlow (1976) 58 Cal.App.3d 340, 348 [ 129 Cal.Rptr. 824 ].) The principal question presented here is whether a labor organization, authorized to represent all the employees in a bargaining unit pursuant to federal law, may provide that…