August 12, 2019

The number of violations of working hour rules by companies employing truck, bus, and taxi drivers increased for four consecutive years, the Labor Ministry announced on August 11.

According to the ministry, of supervised transportation firms surveyed across Japan, more than 80% or 5,424 firms committed labor law violations. The most common illegal act was the violation of work hour rules (3,627 or 55.5%) followed by the violation of overtime rules (1,379 or 21.1%).

Furthermore, 4,006 companies (61.3%) used drivers in violation of the ministry’s instructions regarding protection of drivers from excessively long working hours. The major violations are: forcing workers to sit behind the wheel longer than the ministry-set maximum daily limit (46.6%) and the imposition on drivers of a rest period shorter than the period required in the ministry’s instructions.

The Labor Ministry’s instructions regarding measures to reduce overwork by truck, bus, and taxi drivers requires employers to provide an eight-hour continuous rest period to the drivers and to not use them for more than 13 hours a day.

Among companies which the ministry cited as examples prosecuted for serious labor law violations, a bus company where a driver died from overwork forced more than 20 bus drivers to work illegal overtime of up to 150 hours per month.

Past related articles:
> Yamato transport decides to pay unpaid overtime to 70,000 workers [March 5, 2017]
> Truck drivers’ being overworked due to deregulation triggers major accidents [October 31, 2016]
> Bus drivers’ overwork leads to fatal accidents [March 16, 2014]