A law that requires for the first time all private- and public-sector employers to adopt provisions to permit their workers to take leave to care for sick children and other family members was passed by the Diet in early June. The law will go into effect in April 1999. It requires employers to introduce schemes guaranteeing that employees who take a certain amount of leave to tend to family members are able to return to their posts. Drawn up with an eye to the needs of Japan's rapidly aging society, the new legislation aims to prevent workers from being compelled to quit their jobs in order to look after their families.
According to statistics compiled by the Management and Coordination Agency, in 1993 more than 2 million elderly people in Japan required some form of nursing, and some 81,000 people had to give up their jobs in order to take care of family members. By the year 2025, the ministry predicts, the graying of Japanese society will drive these numbers up to 5.2 million and 220,000, respectively. Against this backdrop, it is believed that passage of the new family leave law, which aims to ensure that workers with family members requiring care are able to keep their jobs, will help make their family lives and careers more compatible.
The law sets minimum standards for family leave systems: (1) Workers are eligible to take leave in order to care for their spouses, children, parents, or spouse's parents. (2) Leave may be taken once for each family member in a situation requiring care. (3) Leave may be taken for up to three consecutive months. The law specifies that if an employee applies for leave within these terms, his or her employer cannot refuse, and it forbids firing an employee for taking leave or requesting to do so. Furthermore, the law obliges employers to establish measures to allow employees in a care-giving situation to work shortened hours, coming to work later or leaving early, for at least three months (in conjunction with any leave time that is taken). However, there are no provisions for punishing an employer that fails to comply with these standards.
Although the law does not address wage compensation, Minister of Labor Manso Hamamoto explained before the Diet that the government would adopt a flexible approach to establishing provisions by 1999. It is expected that a portion of workers' salaries will be paid from the employment insurance scheme.
Some Japanese businesses had adopted family leave provisions even before enactment of the new law. A 1993 Labor Ministry study indicated that 51.9% of all enterprises with more than 500 employees already had such a system in place. The same study showed, however, that only 14.2% of Japan's numerous small and medium-sized enterprises (those employing 30 to 99 workers) had taken similar measures, making for an overall average of 16.3%. On the basis of such studies, the ministry judged that it would require some time for all Japanese businesses, especially smaller ones, to prepare themselves to implement family leave, which led to the adoption of the four-year phase-in period.
Because more than 60% of those companies that have already introduced the concept give their employees up to one year leave, labor representatives have complained that the three-month minimum standard set by the new law is too short. The Ministry of Labor, however, has stressed that the three-month period is only a minimum and that the thrust of the legislation is to encourage employers to make efforts to adopt more comprehensive schemes that surpass these standards.
(The above article, edited by Japan Echo Inc., is based on domestic Japanese news sources. It is offered for reference purposes and does not necessarily represent the policy or views of the Japanese Government.)