Over the weekend the proposed contract between the United Auto Workers and Chrysler LLC faced even stiffer opposition, with workers in three more plants rejecting the agreement.

UAW locals at Chrysler plants in St. Louis, Detroit, and Newark, Delaware voted against the proposal bringing the total number of negative local votes to at least four, with the Detroit News reporting six.

The balloting margins are decisive with production workers at Detroit's Jefferson North plant casting a 56.7 percent negative vote and skilled trades workers at the same facility returning 79.5 percent against.

Approximately 45,000 UAW members who work for Chrysler are eligible to vote, with a majority required for the contract to be ratified. Significantly, the contract was sent to the rank-and-file without the unanimous assent of the union's national leadership.

Concerns about the contract focus on the agreement's failure to provide future product promises as well as on provisions that would allow newly hired workers to receive only half the current rate of $28 per hour recieved by veteran employees.

Of the remaining locals still to vote, Local 1700 at the Sterling Heights assembly plant in Michigan is headed by Bill Parker who authored the minority position in opposition of the contract.

Should the contract fail to win ratification, UAW negotiators and Chrysler will be forced to return to the bargaining table in an effort to work out an agreement more in line with worker concerns and demands.