Japan toughens checks on disabled workers' employment

The revised law on promoting the employment of people with disabilities gives the labor ministry the power to urge state organs and municipalities to take corrective action if it finds them to have reported false employment rates of disabled workers.

Once again "urge".....you think the associated ministries are going to listen to another bureaucrats urges?

They will just throw them a proverbial roll of toilet paper!

But it is facing difficulties in retaining them as already about 130 people have left.

How are they hired? Full time "komuin"? (doubt it) I will bet the hiring practices themselves are discriminatory as well, as the people who are doing the hiring are full time koumin, and to get hired koumuin have to pass a rather difficult exam and odds are that the hiring standards for people with disabilities have been loosened, so they are not getting equal pay, are relegated to "make work" positions and probably shunned in the work place as well.

Damn straight I would quit too!

The government MUST improve education to teach people about people with disabilities and make them an integral part of society, not just some after thought!

Public institutions and private businesses will also be required to retain documents such as photocopies of disability certificates, which would be reviewed by the ministry.

No one seems to care about the privacy of the individual. These are people's lives not stats to be checked!

I am familiar with this system as I work in my company's personnel department and they are always talking about how they're going to have to pay fines.

What I don't understand is how no mention is made of disabled people being obligated to tell their employers about their disabilities. I myself have a government-recognized visual disability and haven't told the company; why would I? I was bullied for it and can't see anything good coming from revealing it as long as I can still do my job. Eventually if my job changes and I need some kind of accommodation (which might well happen; they are considering making us use laptop computers, whose screen fonts are far too small for me to see), I suppose I'll have to tell them, but the idea that employers should get this info as a matter of course is a little weird to me.

My company isn't even talking about making things easier for people with disabilities; they're planning to just pay the fine. And the company receives money from the government for each disabled person they hire, but that money doesn't get earmarked for any kind of accommodation costs nor is it passed on to the worker; they just pocket it. So why would a disabled person reveal their secret if they didn't have to?

Less paperwork more common sense, come on Japan.

@Thon, definitely! That's the reason why those companies padded the number of disable persons they hire. To get "freebies" from the govt.

It is interesting that any government would put numerical quotas without first evaluating areas where such people can and may possibly be employed. Then they must first "prepare" both the site, location, facilities and the other employees before bringing them in. All of that takes time, money and effort at the front line where such employees will be coming into.

Then they must also have a system of evaluating the disabilities and determine their suitability in those areas being prepared. That requires properly trained and qualified personnel to do the evaluation. Are they available?

Then they must have a phase in process... which in Japan is usually about 3 months to determine suitability and work-ability of that individual so hired. That process also requires properly trained training and evaluating personnel. And attrition works both ways, the hired and the hiring. So the disabled also determines of they want the position for which he/she was hired.

But most important is to determine if such individuals are hired for their ability or just for their designation as a disabled person. The government can be spending ineffective time and effort and public funds just to satisfy their public image of having hired the disabled.

Given all that to have come up with a figure may be because they have done all the prep work. However, to put a time line to fill a certain number may be a bit too demanding. To have a goal or objective target date may be meaningful but to have a definite quota by a certain date is in this case, like putting the cart before the horse.

The actual percentage of people with disabilities in the workforces of national-level public bodies, including staff at parliament and courts, as of June 2018 stood at 1.22 percent, far below the legal quota of 2.5 percent.

I dunno about this statistic. I’m quite sure many workers considered as normal employees could easily be added to the handicapped employees’ list.

Government ministries and agencies lying about the number of disabled people they employ?! No way. Not in form over substance Japan,

The Labor Ministry needed a law to be able to urge something? Complete and utter nonsense.