LatinNews Daily - 20 July 2023

* The governments of Mexico and the US have announced an agreement on a course of remediation to address denials of labour rights at a plant of US firm Goodyear Tyre and Rubber Co in Mexico’s San Luis Potosí state. This follows a request made by the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR) to Mexico in May under the rapid response mechanism of the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) to review whether workers’ rights at the plant were being violated. Having accepted the request, the investigation by Mexico’s government concluded that workers at the facility were being denied the right to freedom of association and collective bargaining. The course of remediation, which has a deadline of 19 January 2024, involves ensuring workers at the plant are aware of their rights as stipulated in a sector-wide agreement, informing workers of how to file complaints, monitoring the facility, and implementing a programme of back-payments and compensation to workers who were underpaid or did not receive the benefits to which they have a right as a result of Goodyear’s failure to ensure workers’ rights. In a statement, Katherine Tai, the US Trade Representative, commended Mexico for “committing to take action at Goodyear and in overseeing the just application of the sector-wide agreement to the benefit of workers.”