Representatives from municipalities with a large number of foreign residents are calling for the central government to set up a new agency aimed at improving their livelihoods.

The proposal made Thursday by a group of 28 municipalities in seven prefectures said they have recognized the need for the government to create such an entity so that foreigners in Japan will be better off at a time of economic difficulties.

They also proposed that foreigners have the same rights and responsibilities as Japanese nationals and make it mandatory for children with foreign nationality to attend schools in Japan.

The proposal was handed to Democratic Party of Japan Vice Secretary General Goshi Hosono.

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20091128b2.html

Japan saw the number of temporary workers rise by 4.6 percent in fiscal 2008, a survey released by the Ministry of Health Labor and Welfare showed on Thursday.

The number of workers now on temporary contracts stood at 3.99 million for fiscal 2008, in a country that was once known for companies that gave their staff jobs for life.

The survey compiled numbers from 66,424 businesses that declared their employment records to the government in the fiscal year that ended on March 31. In recent years, Japan has seen the number of temporary workers on its books increase, as the baby boomer generation begins to retire, and company workers are replaced by people hired from outside agencies.

In fiscal 2007, the nation saw the number of temporary workers increase by 18.7 percent.

Temporary workers are afforded less rights under the Japanese labor law, and can often be dismissed with very short notice and little compensation.

In the aftermath of the credit crisis that started in the United States last year, many temporary workers were left jobless with little money last winter.

The figures for 2008 showed that 2.81 million people were employed on short-term contracts with companies. The 1.18 million workers were in dispatched to companies on long-term contracts.

The governing Democratic Party of Japan said in its election manifesto this summer that it aims to improve the nation’s employment conditions, and “ban, in principle, the dispatch of temporary workers to manufacturing jobs.” The figures released Thursday showed that the number of temporary workers in manufacturing jobs had risen by 19.6 percent from the previous year to 560,000 people on June 1, 2008.

Critics of the temporary worker system have argued that the insecure nature of the jobs provides a great deal of benefits for large companies, but is on the whole detrimental to society.

In the last year, Japan has struggled to bounce back after suffering a downturn in the aftermath of the credit crisis, with weak employment and bad conditions for households preventing growth in the manufacturing sector from turning into a sustained recovery.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-11/26/content_12542627.htm

The number of immigrants of Japanese descent who had applied for government repatriation aid since the program began in April had reached roughly 16,000 by mid-November, welfare ministry officials said Monday.

http://home.kyodo.co.jp/modules/fstStory/index.php?storyid=472071

The Democratic Party of Japan is likely to give local election voting rights to foreigners with permanent residence status and who are from countries or regions with diplomatic links or other ties to Japan, sources said Monday.

They include South Korea, which has diplomatic ties, and Taiwan, which lacks diplomatic links but has a strong working relationship with Japan, they said. The ruling party may submit the relevant bill in the current extraordinary Diet session, they said.

The bill will not take the so-called reciprocal approach of granting voting rights to long-term foreign residents on the basis of whether their countries confer similar privileges on Japanese citizens, they said.

http://www.asahi.com/english/Herald-asahi/TKY200911110133.html

The Diet affairs chief of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan said Friday that DPJ lawmakers were planning to introduce a bill to grant foreign nationals with permanent resident status the right to vote in local elections.

Kenji Yamaoka also said the current extraordinary Diet session may have to be extended beyond its scheduled end on Nov. 30 because of the need to deliberate on this and 12 other bills.

DPJ Secretary-General Ichiro Ozawa has pushed for giving voting rights to permanent residents of Japan, many of whom are Koreans.

The opposition New Komeito is also in favor of the move.

http://www.asahi.com/english/Herald-asahi/TKY200911070139.html