Japan Press Weekly

Tweet

2013 September 18 - 24 [LABOR]

Part-time teachers at Waseda Univ. form union against unfair termination of contracts

Part-time lecturers at Waseda University formed a union on September 21 to block the university authority’s program to dismiss them after their contract terms up to five years expire. More than 100 part-time lecturers at the university participated in an inaugural rally and joined the union.

The revised Labor Contract Act, which came into force on April 1 this year, requires employers to offer an open-ended contract to non-regular employees who have worked for more than five years. To avoid this regulation, the university management unilaterally changed its work rules and set a limit of five years on the term of contracts with non-regular workers.

The union demands the withdrawal of the adverse changes in the working rules, which put a limit on the term of contracts as well as on the number of courses part-time lecturers can teach.

Ono Eiji, elected as a union leader, said that as intellectuals and contingent workers suffering unfair working conditions, the union will work to further develop Japan’s labor movement.

Japanese Communist Party members of the House of Councilors Tamura Tomoko and Kira Yoshiko, both graduates of Waseda, attended the gathering and encouraged the participants.

Past related article:
> Waseda Univ. pushes part-time lecturers take 6 months off to avoid open-ended job contracts [July 11, 2013]