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2024 July 24 - 30 TOP3 [LABOR]

JCP Chair Tamura addresses Zenroren Convention

Japanese Communist Party Chair Tamura Tomoko addressed the National Confederation of Trade Unions (Zenroren) 32nd Convention starting on July 25 in Tokyo.

Tamura paid her respects to Zenroren affiliates that won wage increases of more than 10,000 yen per member in this year’s “shunto” spring wage offensive.

According to media reports, the Labor Ministry’s Central Minimum Wages Council consisting of representatives of labor and management and experts has decided to recommend the largest-ever national average minimum wage of 1,054 yen in this year’s revision of regional minimum wages. Tamura, however, commented, “This is far from the demand for a nationwide across-the-board minimum hourly wage of 1,500 yen.” Referring to media reports that management at a meeting of the tripartite council asked for “consideration for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SME) that are struggling to operate their businesses,” Tamura stated, “The most effective consideration is to promote wage hikes by directly subsidizing SMEs, not to hold down minimum wage increases.”

She said, “I heard that Toyota Motor Corp., for example, made a net profit of five trillion yen in the 2023 business year, of which two trillion yen will be distributed to its shareholders.” She went on to say, “Since the 2013 Abenomics economic policy, the government has given Toyota, which continues to post record profits, tax breaks of 44 billion yen as an incentive for wage increases. On the other hand, it has given no support to SMEs that are trying to raise wages, even if they are losing money, in order to secure manpower.”

Tamura added, “The JCP will do its utmost to realize a bottom-up economic policy that will return a portion of the huge profits hoarded by large corporations to society by increasing wages and subcontract unit prices. Our party will continue to stand in solidarity with Zenroren’s call for a uniform minimum wage hike to 1,500 yen which will be a pillar of the policy.”

Tamura noted that Zenroren has a commitment to realize a “7-hour day, 35-hour work week” system, and said, “This is a movement to create time for ourselves, time with family and friends, and time that we can have at our own disposal.”

Tamura said, “It was more than 100 years ago that the ‘8-hour day, 40-hour work week’ became the international labor standard. In Japan, however, excessively-long working hours are still prevalent and ‘karoshi’ (death from overwork) has not been eradicated.” She added, “Reducing working hours is the starting point of the labor movement,” and promised that the JCP in solidarity with Zenroren will fight hard to achieve this goal.