On August 14, workers at the Delta Staff Manufacturing garment factory in Nazareno, Mexico voted overwhelmingly in favour of a collective bargaining agreement negotiated by their independent union, the Mexican Worker’s League (La Liga). 548 workers voted to ratify the agreement and only 93 voted against it. The agreement will reportedly provide benefits worth a total of $2.5 million pesos (US$134,000). The factory produces for Gap, Levi’s, Carhartt and Target.

This is only the second case in recent memory in which an independent union has successfully negotiated an authentic collective bargaining agreement with an employer in Mexico’s garment export sector. Mexico’s 2019 labour justice reform granted workers the right to vote by secret ballot on an initial CBA and negotiated revisions to the CBA.

The agreement is the result of a long struggle by the Delta Staff Nazareno workers to win the right to be represented by an independent, democratic union. Their first victory was the rejection of an employer protection contract that had been signed by their employer and a union affiliated with the Confederation of Mexican Workers (CTM) that had provided few, if any, benefits to the workers. On July 20, 2023, the workers voted to reject that agreement in a legally-required CBA legitimation vote, with 762 workers voting against and 153 in favour of the existing CBA.

Both La Liga and the CTM union then applied to the Federal Centre for Conciliation and Labour Registration for a certificate of representativity to gain the legal right to negotiate a new CBA with the employer. In a January 23 union representation election, 563 of the Delta Staff Nazareno workers voted in favour of La Liga and only 79 for the CTM union.

The independent union has also had to overcome the unjust firings of some of its leaders, and had to stage a wild cat strike to protest the employer’s failure to provide a profit-sharing bonus, as required by law.

When asked what has changed since La Liga won the right to negotiate, Margarita Triana of the union bargaining committee stated, “In the past, we never had a voice in the determination of our salary. In addition to the content of our contract, we now have won the right to sit at the table with the employer, at the same level rather than beneath them. Today we have a voice to advocate for our real necessities.”