News

Govt to limit 2nd-graders to 35 per class next year

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The government plans to limit the number of second-year students at public primary schools to 35 per class starting in the 2012 academic year, sources said Saturday.

The system was introduced for first-year students at public primary schools in the 2011 school year.

To realize the plan, the government plans to employ about 1,000 more teachers, appropriating the necessary outlay in the fiscal 2012 budget, without revising the current law.

The education and finance ministries have concluded that the government will not face a heavy fiscal burden if the number of teachers can be increased without revising the relevant laws.

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T111217003275.htm

Young teacher’s 2004 self-immolation caused by job stress, court rules

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On-the-job stress is what pushed an elementary school teacher here to commit suicide in 2004, the Shizuoka District Court ruled on Dec. 15.

Siding with plaintiff Kenji Kimura, 62 — father of teacher Yuriko Kimura, who was 24 at the time of her death — the court ruled against the Fund for Local Government Employees’ Accident Compensation, which had refused to recognize the suicide as a “job accident.”

According to the decision handed down by Presiding Judge Tsutomu Yamazaki, when Yuriko Kimura was hired in April 2004 and put in charge of an unruly class of fourth graders, she was “exposed to continued extreme stress and did not receive appropriate support,” causing her to develop symptoms of depression. Furthermore, “the students’ problematic behavior continued to occur frequently, and disrupted classes became the norm.” The court ruled that the severe depression caused by these circumstances led to her self-immolation later that year after receiving a written complaint from a parent.

The accident compensation fund argued that Kimura had abandoned class discipline and let the students run wild, and otherwise demonstrated a lack of social skills, claiming her subsequent depression was partly her own fault.

The court ruling also stated that the teachers and school administrators who criticized Kimura for poor teaching should have been more supportive, saying the lack of that support was “a very large problem.”

At a press conference after the trial, Kenji Kimura told reporters, “I want a thorough check on what’s going on at the school and measures to be put in place so this doesn’t happen again.”

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20111216p2a00m0na003000c.html

Average winter bonus for gov’t employees goes up 4.1%

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The government’s rank-and-file employees received on average of about 617,100 yen in winter bonuses, up 4.1 percent from a year earlier, as the Democratic Party of Japan-led government failed to make deep cuts in wages.

The average bonus for a government employee is equivalent to 2.02 months pay, which is some 1,900 yen higher than if a 0.23 percent pay cut had been implemented. The authority’s proposal is designed to make up for the gap with pay from the private sector.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20111209p2g00m0dm024000c.html

Nurses in Japan find language a barrier

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“It’s like taking a nursing course all over again, but this time, in Japanese.”

That is what Filipino nurses here told Labor Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz when they met on Sunday and asked the labor chief for help in hurdling the national nursing board exams of Japan.

Baldoz said she met with six nurses and five caregivers who came here under the Japan-Philippines Economic Partnership Agreement (Jpepa), and they asked for help because the board exams were in Japanese and “were really very difficult.”

“They asked for assistance in their review and suggested that we negotiate (with the Japanese) to find ways to make the exams easier. They said the exams were really very difficult,” Baldoz said in an interview.

“They said it was like studying again, but this time using the Japanese language,” she added.

Baldoz is in Japan to attend the International Labor Organization’s 15th Asia and the Pacific Regional Meeting (APRM), which will discuss jobs protection and economic growth amid the global financial crisis.

Baldoz said the government would raise the issue when Japan and the Philippines review the Jpepa next month.

“That’s one area we will take up in January when we have the negotiations in Manila. We will be looking into areas for improvement and that is one of the things we will check,” Baldoz said.

“The Philippine embassy here will also send some communication and I will have all of this reviewed,” she added.

Baldoz said there was already an initiative to translate the most recent Japanese board exams into English so that this could serve as a reviewer for the Filipino nurses.

“They really need this because they find the exams difficult since it’s in Japanese. They can’t understand it. You have to study Japanese for a long time to be adept at using it,” she said.

Sent back to Philippines

Under Jpepa, 1,000 Filipino nurses and caregivers are supposed to be sent to Japan to help care for its aging population. The nurses are given three years to study for their exams while working as “nursing trainees.” Those who fail are sent back to the Philippines.

As of May 2011—or nearly five years after the Jpepa was signed and nearly three years after it was ratified by the Philippine Senate—only two Filipino nurses have passed the licensure exam for nursing while 229 caregivers have been allowed to work here.

“When it comes to (the) salaries (of the nursing trainees), there is no problem. They say they still get a net of P40,000. It depends on the institutions but some of them also get free lodging and food,” Baldoz said.

She said the nurses and caregivers she met were mostly from Cotabato, Zamboanga and Bohol. The rest were from Luzon.

http://globalnation.inquirer.net/20297/nurses-in-japan-find-language-a-barrier

Labor ministry proposes requiring firms to hire employees till age 65

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The labor ministry proposed Wednesday requiring companies to keep their workers employed till the age of 65 if they wish to continue working even after reaching the retirement age of 60, in light of the government’s plan to raise the pensionable age from 60 to 65 in stages.

It is uncertain, however, if the bill would be enacted as expected, as employers are opposed to making continued employment obligatory.

Under the current law, companies are obliged to keep their workers employed until they reach 65, but the law also allows firms to select which workers to employ based on various criteria including their ability.

The ministry also said raising the retirement age itself to 65 would be “a mid- to long-term agenda.”

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20111215p2g00m0dm024000c.html

Occupy Wall Street resonates within Japan

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Author Karin Amamiya gives her views on the OWS movement in the monthly media magazine Tsukuru (December) and finds many similarities between Japan and the U.S. As opposed to a U.S. poverty rate of 15.1 percent, Japan’s is over 16 percent. The number of welfare recipients in Japan has shot past 2 million, and percentage of those in the work force holding nonregular jobs is at its highest level ever — 38.7 percent.

Last Thursday, a five-page article in Shukan Bunshun (Dec. 8) gave one of the gloomiest indications yet that the prolonged recession has had a pronounced effect on the incomes of Japan’s wage earners.

According to business consultant Masao Kitami, during 1997-2007, total wages declined by ¥20 trillion. “When people say Japan is becoming a society with a widening income gap,” he writes, “I tell them, we’ve descended into a ‘low-wage society.'”

Based on surveys of major corporations belonging to Keidanren (the Japan Business Federation), Kitami provides the latest data showing significant drops in wages between 2007-2010. The declines in the greater Tokyo region — where workers typically receive the highest remuneration in Japan — have been particularly steep. For males in their 50s, for example, the mean annual compensation dropped from ¥5.58 million in 2007 to ¥4.81 million in 2010. After withholdings, monthly take-home pay by younger salaried workers may be less than ¥200,000.

Kitami warns that once the annual incomes of males in their 50s living in Japan’s three main urban areas plummets below ¥5 million, the current social welfare model, based on a nuclear family composed of husband, wife and two children, is in danger of collapse.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/fd20111204bj.html

All employees in Japan are entitled to paid leave, period

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Reader A is employed by an agency and has been dispatched to a food processing company. The agency explained to A that she was not entitled to paid leave. However, other people directly employed by the food processing company enjoy 10 to 15 days paid holiday, and A has recently learned that those dispatched by other agencies to the same company also get paid leave.

In justifying the decision not to grant A paid leave, the agency said that A’s work schedule is irregular depending on the company calendar. However, A says she is working the night shift eight hours a day, 40 hours a week at least.

A, I assume that you have been dispatched legally, that is, based on the Act for Securing the Proper Operation of Worker Dispatching Undertakings and Improved Working Conditions for Dispatched Workers. Under this act, “worker dispatching” is defined as “causing a worker(s) employed by one person so as to be engaged in work for another person under the instruction of the latter, while maintaining his/her employment relationship with the former, but excluding cases where the former agrees with the latter that such worker(s) shall be employed by the latter” (Article 2). If this is the case, you have an employment relationship not with the company where you are dispatched (hakensaki) but with the agency that dispatches you (hakenmoto).

Paid leave is a right all employees are entitled to. A worker who has been employed continuously for six months from the day they were hired and has reported for work on at least 80 percent of their assigned workdays must be granted annual paid leave, according to Article 39 of the Labor Standards Act.

If you fulfill the conditions for paid leave, you have a legal right to demand it from your agency. If the agency still refuses, you should report them to the relevant labor standards bureau, who will conduct an investigation and either suggest or request the agency grant you paid leave if a violation is found.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/fl20111213ll.html

Joytalk ALTs Unionized

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Zenkoku Ippan Tokyo General Union and its Tozen ALTs Branch recently declared the existence of its Joytalk Shop to management and submitted a slate of 28 collective bargaining demands.

組合加入通知並びに団体交渉申し入れ書

Declaration of New Members, Request for Collective Bargaining

拝啓　貴社におかれましては、益々ご繁栄のこととお喜び申し上げます。

We hope your business is doing well.

さて、このたび私たちは、貴社従業員の全国一般東京ゼネラルユニオン（以下、「組合」という）ならびに全国一般東京ゼネラルユニオン東ゼンＡＬＴ支部（以下、「支部」という）への加入を通知いたします。貴社は本日より、組合員の雇用・労働条件ならびに、その他労働条件に関連する事項について、当組合ならびに支部と協議決定する義務のあることを申し添えます。

We hereby inform you that some of your employees have joined Zenkoku Ippan Tokyo General Union (hereafter, “union,”) and Zenkoku Ippan Tokyo General Union Tozen ALTs (hereafter, “local”). From this day forth, your company is obligated to negotiate with the union and local regarding union members’ employment, working conditions and all items related to working conditions.

当組合ならびに支部は、良好な労使関係を確立するために、誠意をもって交渉に臨む所存です。貴社におかれましては、速やかに当組合ならびに支部との団体交渉に応じるよう要請いたします。なお、団体交渉を拒否することは、労働組合法第７条に違反する不当労働行為に該当することを念のために申し添えます。

Our union and local will negotiate in good faith in order to establish a positive labor-management relationship. Therefore, we ask that you promptly agree to collective bargaining with the union and local without committing any unfair labor practices. We also add that refusing collective bargaining is an unfair labor practice in violation of Article 7 of Trade Union Law.

以下の要求事項を議題とし、以下の日時・場所で、団体交渉を申し入れます。

We ask for collective bargaining regarding the demands listed below at the below date, time and venue.

なお、今回、要求事項が２８項目と多岐にわたりましたが、第1回団交でこのすべてについて話し合うことは到底できないことは承知しておりますので、どこから話し合うかという点についても、貴社と丁寧に協議を尽くしたいと考えています。組合員は、長期的に安定した雇用を確保し、引き続き貴社と良好な関係を築いていくことを望んでおります。当方の趣旨をお汲みとりいただきますよう、何卒宜しくお願いいたします。

We understand that it is impossible to discuss all 28 demands at the first collective bargaining session. We would like to negotiate these demands with you carefully and thoroughly. Union members hope to build and maintain a positive relationship with management based on long-term job security.

…

３．要求事項 Demands

安定した雇用について　　　On job security…

1. Management eliminate temporary employment status for all union members, recognizing open-ended employment with no deterioration in working conditions in order to give members job security.

会社は、安定した雇用を実現するため、全組合員に対し、労働条件を悪化することなく、有期雇用の雇用形態を廃止し、期間の定めのない雇用を認める。

事前協議について　　On prior consultation …

2. Management inform the local and union well in advance of any changes to working conditions, management, terms of employment or shugyo kisoku work rules. Management negotiate and obtain agreement with union and local before implementing any such changes.

会社は、組合員の従来の契約内容・労働条件を変更する場合、また就業規則を変更する場合、事前に時間的な余裕をもって組合ならびに支部に通知し、協議の上、同意を得て実施すること。

3. Management inform, negotiate with and obtain agreement from union and local before any transfers, disciplinary measures or dismissal (including all forms of employment severance against the wishes of the employee) of any union member.

会社は、組合員の人事異動、懲戒処分、解雇（本人の意思に反するあらゆる雇用終了を含む）を行う場合、事前に組合ならびに支部に通知し、協議の上、同意を得て実施すること。

4. Management inform and make a mutual arrangement with local members before visiting schools to observe classes etc. and that any such visit shall have a minimum of one month’s advance notice.

会社は、授業参観などの目的で組合員の学校へ訪問する場合、該当組合員に１カ月以上の予告をし、組合員の都合に合わせて訪問の日程を決めること。

5. Management obtain consent from any union member before scheduling work on weekends.

会社は、全組合員に対し、土日の勤務を組む場合、事前に該当する組合員の同意を得ること。

透明性について　　On transparency …

6. Management provide union and local with Japanese language and English language versions of their shugyo kisoku official work rules.

会社は、組合員に適用される就業規則の日本語版と英語版の両方を組合ならびに支部に交付すること。

7. Management immediately disclose and explain each year’s financial documents, including profit-loss statement and balance sheet.

会社は、毎年の損益計算書、貸借対照表などの財務諸表について、速やかに組合ならびに支部に公開し、説明すること。

8. Management immediately give to the union and local a copy of the contract between company and all school boards where members work.

会社は、会社と組合員が働いている全ての教育委員会との間に締結されている契約書の写しを組合ならびに支部に付与すること。

9. Management explain in writing to the union and local the terms of the contract (“haken” or “gyomu itaku”) for each member, and how the type of contract affects the member’s work.

会社は、会社と教育委員会との間で締結している契約（上記第７条を参照）が派遣なのか、業務委託なのかといった契約形態について、組合ならびに支部に文書で明らかにし、併せて組合員の労働環境に与える影響を説明した文書を組合ならびに支部に付与すること。

金銭要求　Financial Demands

10. Management pay full actual transportation costs to all members.

会社は、全組合員に対し、交通費の実費を支給すること。

11. Management increase the salary of union members to ¥290,000 per month.

会社は、全組合員の賃金を月２９０，０００円に引き上げること。

12. Management count the training days forced upon members during July as additional working days to be paid at an additional ¥15,000 per day and refund full actual transportation costs.

会社は、全組合員に対し、７月に働かされる研修の日を労働日とし、日給１５，０００円および交通費の実費を追加に支給すること。

13. Management pay a full salary for August 2011

会社は、全組合員に対し、２０１１年８月について、１カ月分の全額の賃金を支給すること。

14. Management refrain from deducting any wages from any member who participates in collective bargaining during work hours.

会社は、所定時間内に開催する団体交渉出席者の賃金カットを行なわないこと。

15. Management refund all costs for medical checks required of union members.

会社は、組合員に健康診断を義務付ける場合、その費用の全額を負担すること。

…

他の要求事項　Other Demands

18. Management give 10 days paid annual leave to union members who have worked for six months (12 after 18 months, etc. according to Labor Standards Law) to be used at their own discretion, and not as management dictates.

会社は、全組合員に対し、労働基準法に則り、６カ月勤続後１０日間、１８カ月勤続後１２日間等の年次有給休暇について、本人が自由に取得できることを認めること。

19. A substitute ALT is not sent to a school if there are no lessons.

会社は授業の無い日に代行ALTを派遣しないこと。

20. Management use teacher evaluations only to help teachers further improve their performance and not let evaluations affect pay. All evaluations submitted by the school to the company are shown to the union in their original form.

会社は、教員の評価を賃金などに一切反映させず、該当する教員の能力・技術等の改善という目的に限定すること。会社は教育委員会が会社に提出する評価書の写しを、組合並びに支部に付与すること。

21. Management change our payday from the 25th of the month to the 15th of every month, to coincide with monthly payments such as rent and utilities.

会社は、給与支払日を家賃や光熱費などの支払いに合わせて、現在の翌月の２５日から翌月の１５日に変更すること。

22. Management assign teachers with experience to run training sessions.

会社は、研修を行うトレーナーの任命については、ＡＬＴ経験を持つ人に限ること。

23. Management arrange for all union members to have lockers at their workplaces (schools).

会社は、全組合員に対し、職場である学校の中に個人用ロッカーを手配すること。

24. Management explain about their current shakai hoken deductions

会社は社会保険の控除の詳細について組合並びに支部に文書で説明すること。

労使の信頼関係維持について　　Maintaining Relationship of Trust between Management and Union

25. Management comply with all articles of all labor laws, particularly Trade Union Law, and refrain from discriminating against or harassing any union member.

会社は、労働組合法をはじめ全ての労働法規を遵守し、いかなる組合員に対する差別行為、いやがらせ行為などをしないこと。

26. Management permit a union representative be present at all members’ meetings with management.

会社は、経営側が組合員と面談をする場合、組合の代表する者の立ち会いを認めること。

27. Management permit the union and local to conduct a 30-minutes union orientation, including passing out information, at all training sessions. Management inform the union at least four weeks in advance of the date, time and venue for all such training sessions.

会社は、全ての研修会に、組合ならびに支部に、情報配布などを含めた３０分のオリエンテーション（説明会）を行うことを許可すること。なお会社は、研修を行う４週間前に、日時・場所などを組合ならびに支部に通知すること。

28. Management sign a labor-management agreement with the union and local on the above demands.

会社は、上記の要求事項に基づいて、組合ならびに支部と労働協約を締結すること。

以上

Calm at J. Village belies the danger

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Crisis worker woes, shortage another story

Tokyo Electric Power Co. on Friday for the first time let reporters into the base camp for thousands of workers striving every day to fix the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, showing off new dining facilities, a dormitory for single workers and the latest radioactivity monitors to check vehicles and clothing.

What wasn’t readily apparent, however, is the number of temporary dispatch workers without job or health insurance, and who face the ax once their radiation exposure tops out, according to a municipal assembly member from a nearby city.

But despite significant improvements in services and facilities at J. Village [a former soccer training complex now being used by Tepco], serious problems have remained for workers at Fukushima No. 1, insiders say.

Hiroyuki Watanabe, a member of the Iwaki Municipal Assembly, has interviewed about 20 nuclear plant workers and some have told him conditions were extremely bad. Some even claimed they only had a verbal contract for the job.

Many were sent by subcontractor dispatch companies that do not provide job or health insurance, which is illegal, Watanabe said.

The workers are often abandoned by personnel companies once their cumulative radiation exposure exceeds the legal limits, Watanabe said.

“For example, one worker kept working at the Fukushima No. 1 plant for more than 10 years. Even after the accident, he kept working and he was fired after his dose exceeded 40 millisieverts,” Watanabe said. “He had once falsified his exposure records so he would not lose his job.”

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20111112a3.html

Teachers bolt jobs over mental angst

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Stress, depression behind twentyfold 10-year increase in resignations of first-year educators

The number of first-year teachers who left their job for health reasons has increased twentyfold over the past 10 years, with most citing apparent emotional issues, an education ministry survey has found.

According to the survey, conducted on 25,743 public school teachers who began working in fiscal 2010, 101 voluntarily left within a year for “health” reasons, mainly depression and stress, compared with five in fiscal 2000.

Ninety-one of the 101 who quit were suffering emotional issues such as depression, the ministry said Tuesday.

“We believe (those teachers) suffered from a gap between reality and what they imagined before they start working. . . . Some were believed to have trouble dealing with difficult parents. Some may have suffered from human relationships at their workplaces,” education ministry official Masashi Izumino told The Japan Times on Wednesday.

Starting in fiscal 2009, the ministry began investigating the mental health of teachers who quit within a year. In the first survey, 83 of 86 who quit did so reportedly due to such apparent psychological troubles.

Of the 91 teachers last year who quit for such reasons, Tokyo had the highest number, with 29, followed by Chiba Prefecture with six and Aichi Prefecture with five.

Stress has been an issue not only among new teachers but veterans as well in recent years.

According to an education ministry report last year, 8,627 public school teachers took a leave of absence for health reasons in fiscal 2009. Of these, 5,458, or 63.3 percent, did so due to psychological problems.

The number of teachers taking temporary leave for mental health reasons has been steadily rising since fiscal 2000, the report said. While 0.24 percent of public school teachers took a leave of absence in fiscal 2000, the percentage rose to 0.60 in fiscal 2009, it said.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/nn20111110a5.html