Japan Press Weekly

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2016 March 23 - 29 [POLITICS]

Eligibility investigations under secrets protection law will promote discrimination against people with mental illnesses

Materials recently obtained by Akahata indicate a risk that eligibility investigations under the Act on Specially Designated Secrets Protection will increase human rights violations and discrimination against people suffering from mental health problems.

The law requires state organs to conduct a probe to determine the eligibility of people who have access to specially designated secrets. The materials that Akahata obtained from the Japan Fair Trade Commission through an information disclosure request were documents used for eligibility investigations.

This examination is carried out not only on government employees but also on private company workers. As of the end of 2015, the number of people investigated stood at 97,650. Of them, 2,200 were workers in private firms.

In the examination, targeted workers have to answer 40 questions concerning their job history, academic qualifications, nationality, and other personal information. In addition, they also have to respond to questions regarding their family members and their spouses’ relatives.

Furthermore, those workers are demanded to provide information whether they had to receive medical treatment and counseling due to mental health problems, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, drug addiction, and alcohol addiction, in the past 10 years.

As the reason for this demand, the government explained that those who suffer from mental illnesses have a higher risk of leaking information designated as “specific secrets”, as if to say that people struggling with mental disorders pose a security risk.

In addition to supervisors, co-workers, and friends of workers subjected to the probe, their hospitals and banks will also face an inquiry regarding their medical information.

As people have no obligation to present their personal information regarding mental health conditions even to their employers, the government measure to collect such confidential information constitutes a violation of people’s constitutional right to privacy. It is obvious that the state secrets protection act itself lacks rationality.

The Japanese Society of Psychiatry and Neurology issued a statement opposing the eligibility examination two times before the law on the protection of state secrets came into effect in December 2014.

Criticizing the examination as medically irrelevant, the statement emphasizes that it is totally unacceptable for the government to carry out such an investigation under the poorly-thought-out legislation.

Past related articles:
> Japan’s psychiatrists criticize state secrets protection law [August 28, 2014]
> What the secrets protection bill is all about [October 27, 2013]