Lower House approves mass-impoverishing national budget

The House of Representatives plenary meeting on March 5 approved the government draft budget for FY 2004 with a majority force of the Liberal Democratic and Komei parties, and sent it to the House of Councilors.

Three opposition parties, the Japanese Communist Party, the Democratic Party of Japan, and the Social Democratic Party, voted against.

Earlier in the day, the Lower House Budget Committee meeting voted down a JCP motion to consider the JCP proposal to have the FY 2004 budget recompiled in defense of the people's livelihoods and basic social services.

The government draft of the budget will impose an extra burden of 3 trillion yen on the people over the next three years, cut funding for local governments, and support the unconstitutional dispatch of the Self-Defense Forces to Iraq.

JCP representative Yoshii Hidekatsu used his speech in the plenary session to criticize the government budget plan for "going against economic recovery and a secure livelihood which the people want above all else." Criticizing the government bill for helping the planned adverse revision of the pension system, Yoshii stated that the JCP will strive to achieve a national budget in which the people are the primary beneficiaries.

The JCP called for a recompilation of the budget to: (1) create 6.5 trillion yen in revenue by reviewing public works projects, cuts in military expenditure, and a halt to tax breaks for large corporations and the wealthy; (2) use the fund on social services without a tax increase on the masses; and (3) to end the SDF dispatch and shift Japan's aid for Iraqi reconstruction into a U.N.-led framework for peace. (end)