Japan Press Weekly

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2014 November 12 - 18 [LABOR]

JCP Koike: Don’t use foreign trainees for nursing care employment under harsh working conditions

Japanese Communist Party member of the House of Councilors Koike Akira criticized the Abe Cabinet on November 11 for moving to allow nursing-care providers in Japan to use foreigners as a cheap labor pool.

In the House health and labor committee meeting, Koike said, “It is preposterous for nursing-care companies to employ foreign workers under harsh working conditions because of a manufactured labor shortage.”

At present, there are 150,000 foreign technical trainees in Japan. The government is considering revising the Technical Intern Training Program (TITP) to extend the training period from the current three years to five years as well as to add the nursing-care sector to the job categories that can use the training program.

The JCP lawmaker pointed out that the TITP has become a source of cheap labor which has brought about foreign trainees’ human rights violations across the country. Citing the fact that the UN has issued a report accusing Tokyo’s irresponsible handling of this issue, Koike demanded that the administration overhaul the internship system.

Labor Minister Shiozaki Yasuhisa replied that he will take into account the points Koike made and increase supervision of companies using foreign interns.

Past related article:
> Use of foreign workers as cheap labor is unacceptable [August 26, 2014]