Shii urges the government to direct employers to hire temporary workers directly

Japan Press Weekly

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Shii urges the government to direct employers to hire temporary workers directly

Japanese Communist Party Chair Shii Kazuo on April 14 met with Labor Minister Masuzoe Yoichi and requested that the government take action in response to temporary workers' requests for direct employment or full-time positions.

The full text of the JCP petition is as follows:

Since autumn of last year, more and more temporary workers have faced layoffs or the early termination of their contracts. A Labor Ministry survey shows that another 192,061 temporary workers will be forced out of work by the end of June. A private sector survey estimates that 400,000 temporary workers were laid off by the end of March. Many have become homeless.

As Shii pointed out at the House of Representatives Budget Committee meeting on February 4, the important thing is that most laid-off temporary workers were hired under illegal labor practices, including working as 'disguised independent contractors' for a period exceeding the legally permitted maximum three years.

The need now is for the Labor Ministry to instruct companies to fulfill their legal obligation to offer temporary workers direct employment or full-time positions if they worked for them for more than three years. Many companies are illegally using temporary workers to evade this legal obligation.

Recently, temporary workers across the country have been complaining about their illegal treatment and demanding that the local Labor Bureaus order companies to hire them directly.

The JCP has found that since February, about 280 temporary workers at 65 companies have asked 31 local Labor Bureaus to order their companies to hire them directly.

So far, only 7 out of 31 labor bureaus took action by urging employers to offer them direct employment. This shows Labor Bureau action is inadequate.

We have found that temporary workers who made requests for direct employment are often harshly treated by the Labor Bureaus. Some offices even refuse to accept temporary workers' requests on the grounds that they did not submit the details of their terms of contract and job descriptions. We also found that some Labor Bureaus treated temporary workers as if they were dealing with criminal suspects. There was even one Labor Bureau that refused to allow observers to accompany workers to the office.

Most temporary workers going to Labor Bureaus are either those whose contracts have expired or who are about to be laid off. Prompt Labor Bureau action in response to their urgent needs is critical for protecting their livelihoods.

The JCP requests that the government, in particular the Labor Ministry, take the following steps immediately:

1. Investigate temporary workers' requests and give advice or instructions to employers to deal with the requests without delay and report the result of the investigation to the workers involved and keep the temporary workers informed of the current status of the investigation.

2. Accept the workers' claims if his/her status as temporary worker can be confirmed even without documents to prove it, and allow observers to attend interviews so that the workers would not be treated at the Labor Bureaus in a dismissive manner. Order the Labor Bureaus to comply with the position expressed by Labor Minister in his statement in the Diet that they must listen to the workers in a sincere manner.

3. Encourage employers to offer temporary workers direct employment based on the October 28, 2008 ministry directive that states that the ministry can direct large corporations to fulfill their legal obligation to directly hire or offer full-time positions to temporary workers who have worked for them for more than three years.

4. Improve the Labor Bureaus so that they can respond to the needs of workers to defend their livelihoods and labor rights and as well as help to improve the stability of the job market.

- Akahata, April 15, 2009