June 6, 2013
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2013 June 5 - 11 [WELFARE]
Gov’t council demands further privatization of childcare service |
The council claims that the government’s failure to encourage various forms of business entities to enter childcare services has kept many children out of the services.
Yamaguchi Hiromi, president of JP Holdings which operates daycare businesses in the Tokyo metropolitan area, showed at the council’s meeting a list of local governments which authorize stock companies to operate daycare facilities and urged the government to further promote corporate entry into the industry.
In accordance with Prime Minister Abe Shinzo’s announcement to encourage local governments throughout the nation to follow the example of Yokohama City, which has private firms operating one-fourth of its authorized daycare centers, the Welfare Ministry on May 15 sent a notice to prefectural governments calling on them to work to have more private companies enter the childcare industry.
For-profit companies are considered by many concerned citizens to be unsuitable to operate daycare facilities which normally allocate more than 70% of costs to payroll. An authorized daycare center run by a business firm in Yokohama City has reduced its labor cost to 40% of its total expenditure.
The regulatory reform council has also demanded that the minimum standards for the size of childcare centers be lowered as a major pillar of measures to reduce the number of children waiting to enter such facilities.
Meanwhile, five parents’ groups and individuals on April 17 made representations to the council and Welfare Minister Tamura Norihisa, urging the government to not lower the standards which they claims are already low.
Related past articles:
> Number of children waiting for authorized daycare facilities is NOT zero in Yokohama (May 22 & 24, 2013)
> Abe wants more for-profit childcare services as in Yokohama (May 22, 2013)
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