U.S. trade chief Tai says watching union vote at Mexican auto-parts plant closely

BALTIMORE, Feb 28 (Reuters) – The United States is watching Monday’s vote on a new union at Mexico’s Tridonex auto elements plant very closely, U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai advised reporters, indicating the United States had an “outsized fascination” in the issue.

“We are looking at that vote very intently,” Tai stated after an occasion at Morgan Point out University in Baltimore. “We certainly have an outsized fascination in conditions of what happens, supplied the earlier agreement that we secured from the firm in terms of their participation in long run elections.”

Nearly 1,700 staff at the Tridonex car-components plant are scheduled to vote on Monday on their union representation after two many years of campaigning by some workers to swap a union that they accused of failing to press for increased wages. read extra

Tridonex in August agreed to assure worker legal rights, pay out severance and back wages to dismissed workers to settle an early labor rights grievance beneath a labor enforcement system in the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).

The AFL-CIO labor group had submitted a criticism with the USTR just after Tridonex personnel stated they were being getting denied the appropriate to freely find their representation.

Monday’s vote will permit staff at the plant in the northern border town of Matamoros to choose amongst their present-day union, element of the Confederation of Mexican Personnel (CTM), and an independent group, SNITIS.

Auro parts maker Cardone, primarily based in Philadelphia, has claimed it will be neutral and do the job with the team elected by personnel.

Reporting by Andrea Shalal modifying by Jonathan Oatis

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