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English just ‘candy’ for the brain
Likening English education to “sweets”–pleasing but unnecessary–[newly appointed] education minister Bunmei Ibuki has again expressed his opposition to making the language compulsory at elementary schools. Questioned on the issue during a post-Cabinet meeting news conference Friday, the new minister insisted that teaching fundamental subjects such as Japanese should come first. Describing those core subjects as…
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Foreigners to need ’skills’ to live in Japan
As suggested in the [Justice Ministry] panel’s interim report released in May, the panel said foreigners who want to work in Japan, including those of Japanese descent, must have a certain degree of proficiency in the Japanese language to be granted legal status. [Senior Vice Justice Minister Taro] Kono called the government’s current policy of granting…
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Trouble looms as foreign labor floods in
…before official discussions on foreign labor go much further, national legislation to outlaw all forms of racial and ethnic discrimination is needed, according to the United Nations and nearly 80 Japan-based human rights organizations, many of which work to protect long-term foreign residents. Without such a law, they argue, Japan will have serious problems with…
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Kanagawa PFT Petition
A petition addressed to the Kanagawa Prefectural Assembly, the Governor of Kanagawa Prefecture, and the Kanagawa Board of Education is being circulated by a group of concerned citizens in support of the teachers dismissed by the Kanagawa Board of Education last April, and calls for the return to direct-hiring in the schools. A copy of…
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Courts refuse to hire lawyers on nationality
Three courts have refused to allow three Korean residents working as lawyers to assume commissioned jobs despite being nominated by their bar associations, because they are not Japanese, attorneys said Thursday. http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20060901a2.html
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This is the New Japan
Takahashi’s frustration underscores a critical disconnect in Japan?a split between what the country is becoming and what most Japanese want it to be. For mostly economic reasons, Japan must open itself to other ethnicities. Japan’s population is not only aging rapidly, but starting to decline. By the year 2050, it is expected to fall from…
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Labour Relations Board Hearing for dismissed ALTs in Kanagawa
In February of 2006, the Kanagawa Board of Education informed all of its 89 Assistant Language Teachers that their contracts would not be renewed, and that the Board would instead be signing a contract with Interac to fill their jobs. Some teachers were offered the chance to keep their jobs, albeit with a new employer…
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‘Disguised contracting’ gets proper airing in media . . . with results
According to the Asahi article, the labor bureaus have been sending warnings to such companies for at least two years. The Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry conducted a survey in 2004 and estimated that there were 870,000 ukeoi laborers in Japan at the time. What’s more, most of the workers who replied to the survey…
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Temp workers
Some firms have neglected their legal requirement to report job-related accidents involving contract temporary workers to the labor authority. Others have left such workers without social security coverage. The practice must be stopped. But simply treating these workers fairly as temporary workers, as they actually are, won’t be enough. Employers should consider offering permanent jobs…
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Japan’s fingerprinting law is dumb . . . (and that’s just what the government thinks)
On May 18, 2006, a little discussed and little debated law passed the Diet. With changes modeled on the “U.S. Visit” system set up in 2003, the Immigration Control Law was amended to require that, from November 2007, all foreigners (except “special” permanent residents) be photographed and fingerprinted upon entering the country. The law has…