Stephanie Ferguson Melhorn
Senior Director, Workforce & International Labor Policy, U.S. Chamber of Commerce
Published
November 21, 2022
An independent union has won the representation vote at a Saint Gobain facility in Cuautla, continuing the expansion of independent unions across Mexico.
A cohort of labor associations, the AFL-CIO, the United Steelworkers, and Sindicato Independiente de las y los Trabajadores Libres y Democráticos de Saint Gobain México, filed a labor complaint petition with the U.S. Department of Labor in late September 2022. The petition alleged that multiple labor rights were denied at Saint Gobain – an automotive glass manufacturer. Specifically, the unions claimed that the facility allowed the current union, the Confederation of Workers and Campesinos, to intimidate and threaten workers ahead of a new representation vote.
The U.S. declined to leverage the USMCA Rapid Response Labor Mechanism in this case. Despite formal intervention, the facility held a vote for union representation, and the Mexican union petitioners won the vote. Now, negotiations related to the new collective bargaining agreement will begin, and the AFL-CIO, the Mexican government, and the U.S. government will continue to monitor progress at Saint Gobain to ensure future votes are free from intimidation, coercion, and retaliation.
Earlier this year, workers at the VU Manufacturing facility in Coahuila, Mexico, opted for union representation for the first time. The workers elected La Liga, an independent union, to represent them in collective bargaining negotiations. This vote was preceded by a formal USMCA labor complaint. The resolution of the VU Manufacturing complaint marked the fifth remediation under the USMCA.
Mexico’s new labor law will fully enter into effect next spring. Any collective bargaining or protection agreements that are not ratified by May 2023 will be void. The dissolution of thousands of incumbent protection agreements makes Mexico’s manufacturing sector ripe for workers to organize and elect independent unions. U.S. employers with operations in Mexico should carefully review their employment operations to ensure compliance with Mexico’s labor law and the USMCA labor chapter.
About the authors
Stephanie Ferguson Melhorn
Stephanie Ferguson Melhorn is the Senior Director of Workforce & International Labor Policy. Her work on the labor shortage has been cited in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and Associated Press.
