June 8, 2022

A cross-party group of former House of Councilors members on June 6 submitted to the President and the Vice President of the Upper House and political parties a proposal calling on political parties to make efforts to put up the same number of male and female candidates in this summer’s Upper House proportional representation election.

The group in its proposal also demanded that if political parties have difficulty in achieving the above-mentioned goal, they must begin discussions on an early introduction of a quota system that requires increasing the proportion of women candidates to 30% of the total.

Later on the same day, some officials of the group, including the group’s head Miyazaki Hideki and former JCP Upper House member Yoshikawa Haruko, met with JCP members of the House of Councilors Kami Tomoko and Inoue Satoshi in the Diet building to exchange views on the group’s proposal.

In the meeting, Kami explained that women candidates make up more than 50% of all JCP candidates nominated for the July Upper House election. This received a high evaluation from the ex-Upper House members’ group.

Past related article:
> JCP Koike: Gender quota system should be introduced in political arena [December 14, 2021]