The election of judges by popular vote can mean that labor trials are not handled by the most qualified profiles and a commitment within the framework of the trade agreement with the United States and Canada is breached.
Labor justice in charge of the Judicial Branch of the Federation (PJF) was one of the changes that Mexico made to comply with the commitments made with the T-MEC. In this way, in the prelude to a constitutional reform that proposes changes in the election of ministers, magistrates and judges, specialists warn that the progress and compliance with the agreements may be put at risk.
At both the federal and local levels, the new labor justice model faces challenges in resolving conflicts within the established deadlines, “and the changes would exacerbate” existing problems, especially if they are accompanied by budget cuts, says Manuel Fuentes Muñiz. , specialist in labor law and professor-researcher at the Metropolitan Autonomous University (UAM).
One of the changes of the constitutional reform to the PJF proposed by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), is the election of judges, magistrates and ministers by popular vote.
The risk with this mechanism is that the judges who are elected do not guarantee the suitability for adequate operation of the labor courts, one of the institutions created with the 2019 labor reform to comply with the resolution of worker-employer conflicts quickly and expeditious
“Having a law degree is not enough, we see it even with the litigation itself, there are many lawyers who handle family or criminal matters, and when they get into the labor issue it is evident that the lack of knowledge is immense. Most of the training of judges in the workplace is through knowledge of jurisprudence, it represents 70% of their knowledge, it is not enough to just know the legislation,” says Manuel Fuentes.
Sofía Gómez Bautista, partner at the Assembla Law firm, agrees with this. An election by popular vote of labor court judges would require an electorate that studies and analyzes the capabilities and experience of the candidates. The risk of choosing profiles that are not suitable is that justice is not prompt and expeditious.
“Having a law degree is not enough, we see it even with the litigation itself, there are many lawyers who handle family or criminal matters, and when they get into the labor issue it is evident that the lack of knowledge is immense. Most of the training of judges in the workplace is through knowledge of jurisprudence, it represents 70% of their knowledge, it is not enough to just know the legislation,” says Manuel Fuentes.
Sofía Gómez Bautista, partner at the Assembla Law firm, agrees with this. An election by popular vote of labor court judges would require an electorate that studies and analyzes the capabilities and experience of the candidates. The risk of choosing profiles that are not suitable is that justice is not prompt and expeditious.
The creation of labor courts was one of the commitments assumed by Mexico with the T-MEC. But the obligation is not only limited to the formation of new institutions, but also to guarantee fair, equitable, transparent procedures and due legal process.
Additionally, final decisions must be “based on information or evidence in respect of which the parties have been given the opportunity to be heard, indicate the reasons on which they are based, and be made available in writing without undue delay,” according to the labor chapter of the treaty.
In 2022, Thea Lee, Deputy Undersecretary of International Affairs of the United States Department of Labor of the United States government, recognized that the creation of a new model of labor justice is the most important achievement of the T-MEC in terms of labor rights.
“The labor reform is relatively recent and that means that hardly all parties involved are getting used to the new model. It would be a setback in labor matters because we have gone through a process of adaptation, and those judges who have already achieved it and have played an admirable and satisfactory role, with them the setback would be seen more,” says Sofía Gómez Bautista.
From the perspective of Alfonso Bouzas, coordinator of the Citizen Observatory of Labor Reform, the Judiciary has areas of opportunity, but he rules out that changes can be made radically and that labor courts are part of the redesign.
The specialist believes that the change to the Judiciary is viable, but recognizes that the consolidation of labor justice is one of the great pending tasks of the current administration and for continued progress in the matter, the allocation of an adequate budget is important.
“You cannot implement a change without professionalizing, without training, without sufficient facilities, and everything depends on money,” emphasizes Alfonso Bouzas.
Labor justice, what is the current scenario? In 2020, the implementation of the labor reform began, with which conciliation centers and labor courts were created, with the aim of offering solutions to conflicts in an agile and expeditious manner.
Until that moment, labor justice was in charge of Conciliation and Arbitration Boards, outside the Judiciary, and which accumulated a significant gap. The new conflict resolution model had a focus on conciliation to avoid saturation of labor courts.
The full implementation of the new labor model has required a budget of more than 10,000 million pesos, largely for the creation of the new institutions.
According to information from the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare (STPS), labor conflicts in federal jurisdiction are resolved in an average of 8.8 months, with the previous model that average was six years.
And although there is progress, the model still has challenges. “In terms of effectiveness we are entering negative territory, the trials are no longer going as planned, there is an accumulation of files and there is already a lack of the Mexican government,” says Manuel Fuentes.
One of the current challenges, the specialist emphasizes, is the disparity in budgets between federal and local authorities, which has caused progress to be uneven in both jurisdictions.
