[CTC] Mexican government outlines labor reform ‘roadmap’

Wed Jun 26 06:30:14 PDT 2019

Mexican government outlines labor reform ‘roadmap’
Inside US Trade
June 25, 2019 at 4:56 PM

Mexico has outlined and submitted to Capitol Hill a “proposed roadmap” showing how it plans to implement its labor law reforms through 2023.

The roadmap <https://insidetrade.com/sites/insidetrade.com/files/documents/2019/jun/wto2019_0201a.pdf> was submitted for the record by House Ways & Means trade subcommittee ranking member Vern Buchanan (R-FL) during a June 25 hearing on Mexican labor reform.

The undated roadmap sets annual benchmarks the country plans to meet when implementing the labor law passed by the Mexican legislature earlier this year. The implementation of that law is a major concern for many Democrats in Congress, who have tied that concern to their consideration of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

Among other items, the document pledges to begin the process of establishing labor tribunals this month, in a “staggered manner.” That three-stage process is set to conclude in October 2022.

Additionally, Mexico’s labor secretariat hopes by July 1 to issue a “protocol for the verification of workers’ consultations through personal, free, direct and secret ballot vote for the review of existing collective bargaining agreements.” Once the protocol is issued, the labor secretariat will begin reviewing existing collective bargaining agreements “starting with the contracts that have more time without having been revised.” The review process will last until May 2023, the document states.

Mexico also says it is in “negotiations and consultations with the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), the International Labor Organization (ILO), the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), and the InterAmerican Development Bank (IDB), among other international agencies and institutions, to receive and execute technical cooperation projects in order to contribute to the implementation of the Labor Reform.”

House lawmakers on Tuesday probed how to assess Mexico’s implementation of its labor reform. Republicans on the trade panel lauded Mexico’s passage of the labor reform legislation and its recent ratification, with Rep. Tom Rice (R-SC) asking “what else could we expect them to do?”

But House Ways & Means trade subcommittee chairman Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) interjected, saying the U.S. should take advantage of Mexico’s eagerness to implement and enforce systemic labor reforms now, “as opposed to moving past this moment when there may not be an eagerness."

Rep. Ron Estes (R-KS), pushing for the expeditious ratification of USMCA, contended that Mexico’s “good-faith efforts” should be met with equal action on Capitol Hill.
Buchanan, meanwhile, advocated for U.S. assistance to ensure “these new laws are implemented.”

“There is no question that implementing these reforms will be a huge undertaking for Mexico and can’t happen overnight -- but that is precisely because the new laws are so transformative,” Buchanan said in opening remarks. “Mexico should not be punished for its ambition. Instead, the United States must stand ready to assist Mexico in ensuring that these new laws are implemented.”

Several Democrats on the panel asked witnesses about what they should look for in assessing whether Mexico was adhering to obligations laid out in USMCA.

Rep. Dan Kildee (D-MI) asked witnesses to describe the “threshold” for Congress. “At one point or another we are going to have this binary choice,” he said, citing the North American Free Trade Agreement and USMCA, “and the question is at what point do we have confidence” that Mexico’s implementation “will be robust and enforcement will be strong?”

Gladys Cisneros, program director at the Solidarity Center in Mexico, said the Mexican government's “political will” to implement meaningful reforms was crucial. The Solidarity Center bills itself as a worker advocacy organization.

“Because so much of this centers on precisely that political will … it is our belief that there are current cases …where the government could very positively intervene to send the right kind of messages and begin to have a more proactive approach to how it will enforce freedom of association,” or the right to bargain collectively, she added. “If they were to take look a serious look at some of those outstanding cases and apply some of the current law mixed with some of the new provisions that could set a very important precedent for how this moves forward."

In response to a question from Rep. Jimmy Panetta (D-CA) about how to improve labor enforcement in Mexico, AFL-CIO International Department Director Cathy Feingold said “you need empowered workers.”

Enabling an environment in which workers have access to independent unions and can “speak out about what is happening in their facilities” is step one, she continued. “We need a process whereby they can carefully say 'This is a problem,' identify it and then that triggers an inspection in that facility,” she said, calling for a “structure that is dedicated to USMCA” because the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative and the Labor Department's Bureau of International Labor Affairs have too much to deal with already. She pointed to a suggestion previously pitched by the AFL-CIO, which involves designating an “ombudsperson that would stay focused on USMCA.”

Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-FL) asked what Congress should look for in the short term to assess whether Mexico was moving in the “right direction.” Cisneros said to watch for the implementation of an independent verification system and resolution of “outstanding key cases,” which she said could signal a “measure of goodwill” and set the “right kind” of precedent.

 “We could also look at indicators that include a reduction in ghost unions, a reduction in phantom contracts; we could also track response to new labor cases that come up,” she said, pointing to ways in which the Mexican government could enhance “the practice of trying to unseat an undemocratic union and replace it with a more authentic democratic organization.”

AFL-CIO’s Feingold pointed to 96 constitutional challenges <https://insidetrade.com/node/166743> recently brought by Mexican labor unions as a “first task” for the U.S. to focus on and ensure “there is pushback against that.” Most of the challenges have been filed by employer-dominated unions, which have largely opposed the new labor law’s requirements.

Additionally, the U.S. should be “supporting what is now an emerging, independent democratic trade union movement. We need to build the capacity,” she said. “We need to do everything we can to support their capacity … there are test cases that we need to support.... [I]f we do not get this right, we will give away all leverage to making sure that these reforms actually happen.”
Rep. Terri Sewell (D-AL), a co-chair of the new House USMCA working group’s enforcement task force, asked how the U.S. could ensure “we get this right on the ground.”

Joyce Sadka, law professor with the Instituto Tecnologico Autonomo de Mexico’s Center for Economic Research, said Mexico must provide more specific information. “One thing that can be done … [is] the Mexican government has to issue protocols that explain how they are going to do things,” she said. “They need to specify what the indicators are that they are going to use to measure the implementation and quality of the new justice system and then we need to see those actually being verified with the frequency that the Mexican government itself has set up as a goal.” –
 Isabelle Hoagland (ihoagland at iwpnews.com <mailto:ihoagland at iwpnews.com>)

Arthur Stamoulis
Citizens Trade Campaign
(202) 494-8826

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.citizenstrade.org/pipermail/ctcfield-citizenstrade.org/attachments/20190626/c1470bda/attachment-0001.html>