Voting is wrapping up at Chrysler, and the United Automobile Workers (UAW) union can breathe a sigh of relief. On Friday 26 October, the contract between the UAW and the Chrysler management was passing by about 56 per cent in favour to 44 per cent opposed, with a margin of about 4,000 votes.

Workers at Chrysler''s plant in Belvidere, Illinois, were the last to vote on the contract on Friday. Most of the plant''s 3,444 workers have said that they oppose the contract, but even a unanimous no vote at Belvidere cannot overturn the deal. Consequently, the UAW will now turn its attention to Ford, the last Detroit company that needs to reach an agreement on a new labour contract.

At General Motors, 66 per cent of the members who voted approved the contract earlier this month after a two-day strike. But the Chrysler vote was very turbulent. Workers at Chrysler walked off the job for six hours, while local union leaders were split over the agreement.

The deal was rejected by four assembly plants, but received support at a number of smaller factories as well as four big plants in the Detroit area, which approved the contract on Wednesday.

Opponents said the Chrysler pact did not provide as many guarantees of future work as the GM contract. That issue is centre stage at Ford, which lost $12.6 billion last year and does not expect to earn a profit in North America before 2009.

Talks there, which proceeded at a slow pace during the Chrysler vote, are expected to step up over the weekend. Generally, the UAW expects to get the same terms under its pattern bargaining, but as at Chrysler, the union may have to settle for something less than the GM pact.

Ford''s United States market share has dropped by nearly 2 per cent this year to 16 per cent. The company is yet to identify the plants it expects to close under a restructuring plan called the ''Way Forward''. Obviously, the UAW wants Ford to reveal its plans.

But this has consequences. Chrysler''s disclosure that it had no plans for a future investment at the St Louis South plant prompted workers there and at the adjacent St Louis North plant to reject the contract. Chrysler workers in Newark, Delaware, whose the plant is scheduled to close, also rejected the contract.

Rather that risk such no votes, Ford instead may try to give as little information as possible about any factory whose future is on the line. Workers, however, want reassurances before they vote in favour of the contract.

But promises are no guarantee. GM has announced plans to eliminate shifts at two Michigan factories since its contract was approved. It remains to be seen whether Ford workers will be in as feisty a mood as their Chrysler counterparts.

But there is cause for concern. Two years ago, Ford workers barely approved a series of cuts in health care benefits that GM workers voted to accept. The slim margin at Ford was a reason Chrysler workers were never asked to vote on similar cuts, for fear they would turn them down. In addition, Ford workers have the benefit of having watched their counterparts at the other companies wrestle with the cuts in their contracts.

But in the wider community, concerns about the contracts centre around the new two-tier wage system that means newly hired workers are paid less than their elders. Elders ask whether it means a sell-out of the next generation of auto workers.