Japan Press Weekly

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2012 November 28 - December 4 [LABOR]

Refusal of elderly worker’s reemployment illegal: Top Court

The Supreme Court on November 29 ordered a company to continue employing an elderly worker and pay him unpaid wages.

Okada Shigeru, 64, is a former worker at Tsuda Electric Meter Co. in Osaka Prefecture. He filed a lawsuit in 2009 against his employer seeking reemployment after his retirement.

The court judgment pointed out that a retired worker who meets certain conditions has a good reason to expect to be reemployed, deciding that the company’s refusal to reemploy the plaintiff is null and void. This is the first time the Supreme Court ruled on such issues as the rejection of rehiring retired employees.

Okada was one of the members who formed a union at their workplace in 1974. He had acted as general secretary of the union for a long time, which is affiliated with the All-Japan Metal and Information Machinery Workers’ Unions (JMIU). When he approached his retirement, in January 2009, the maker denied Okada and other two workers reemployment because of their “bad” job performance.

The plaintiff won his case both in the Osaka District Court in September 2010 and in the Osaka High Court in March 2011. The manufacturer lodged an appeal to the Supreme Court.

As the eligible age to receive pension was revised upward, the revised Act for Stabilization of Employment of Older Persons required employers to extend the retirement age to 65 by April 2006.

Though almost all businesses in the country prepared a continued employment system in accordance with the law, there are still many cases in which union members are refused reemployment.

At a press conference following the ruling, Okada said, “I’m pleased with the judgment. I hope the decision will encourage a lot of workers who are being treated like I have been.”