NTT West workers win compensation for unjustifiable transfers

Japan Press Weekly

Japan Press Service Co., Ltd. is the only news agency providing information of progressive, democratic movements in Japan

NTT West workers win compensation for unjustifiable transfers

The Osaka High Court on January 15 ordered NTT West, one of Japan's major telecommunication companies of the NTT Group, to pay nine million yen in compensation to 17 plaintiffs for illegally transferring workers to distant locations because they did not accept the company's cost-cutting restructuring scheme.

The lawsuit had been filed by 21 NTT West workers.

The High Court ruling modified the lower court decision that had ordered NTT West to pay compensation to just three plaintiffs.

The NTT Group, Japan's largest telecom group, in 2001 launched a corporate restructuring scheme in which all NTT employees would be forced to retire at the age of 51 and rehired at its affiliates with a pay cut of up to 30 percent.

The Telecommunication Industry Workers' Union (Tsushin-roso) members who refused to accept the plan were forcibly transferred to distant locations as a warning to other employees and filed a law suit with district courts across the nation stating that their relocation was illegal.

Concerning the 17 plaintiffs who were transferred from Osaka to Nagoya, the High Court said, "It is hard to acknowledge that it was necessary for NTT West to relocate its employees and force them to commute long hours to travel to their workplaces, away from their families."

The ruling also stated that it is obvious that these transferred workers have been forced to endure physical, mental, and financial burdens as well as decrease in their free time due to their long hours of travel and transfers forcing them to leave their families behind.

Following the ruling, the plaintiffs' group, their lawyers, the National Confederation of Trade Unions (Zenroren), and Zenroren-affiliated Tsushin-roso issued a statement stressing, "We have achieved a great victory with this ruling which is much better than the Osaka District decision. We urge every NTT company to seriously accept the high court ruling against the NTT restructuring scheme, accept what the company should do to defend the public nature of the company's role, give up appealing the case, and settle the case through urgent and sincere collective negotiations."

- Akahata, January 16, 2009