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The SEIU is well on its way to becoming a full-fledged cult. If members were exposed to any kind of debate, they might expect discussion to be allowed in their home locals. Stern is eliminating that possibility by creating megalocals whose leaders are far removed contact with any members, except for those hand-picked by staff. If there are no stewards and no local meetings, then members won't be able to bring up those annoying workplace problems that take staff time away from politics and "organizing". The average members contact with the union will be an 800 number they can call for a non-answer to their problems, plus an occasional mailing or robocall.

Of course after a few years of this kind of representation, SEIU would be ripe for decerts, but they feel that no major union will take them on because of their size and reputation for ruthlessness(and because they've made so many deals with AFLCIO unions like AFT and AFSCME for merged union locals). That's why they are so freaked out by CNA-NNOC. An aggressive union could take SEIU on and decert them in a lot of place.

As a former SEIU staff, I was continually told "we don't do repping",
and that workers with grievances were bad workers who should be fired. SEIU staff should only work with those members that like their bosses and had no problems. This what they really say in the staff meetings. I didn't go along, so I was fired. This is what the SEIU vision of "partnership" really means.