The Fukushima Labour Bureau (Director: Tomonori Kawai) compiled the results of the latest supervision/instructions to decontamination employers.
Based on the result, the Fukushima Labour Bureau will request the primary contractors who are implementing decontamination works to observe the Labour Standards Act and other relevant laws.
The Fukushima Prefectural Labour Department has issued supervisions and instructions to 388 employers within jurisdiction of the Labour Standards Inspection Offices during the period from January to June 2013 in order to ensure proper conditions of employment and the safety and health of workers engaged in decontamination works. The investigations were focused on conditions of employment such as clear indication of conditions of employment, payment of wage, and working hours, reflecting the circumstances that the inquiries were raised about wage and other conditions of employment such as special duty (decontamination) allowance.
Among those employers, a total 264 (violation rate of 68%) were recognized as being in violation of applicable laws such as the Labour Standards Act or Industrial Safety and Health Act. Corrective recommendations were issued to these employers to correct said violations accordingly.
The number of violations was 684, among which 473 were those relevant to conditions of employment; payment of wages (Article 24 of LS Act), payment of increased wages (Article37 of LS Act), clear indication of wages and other conditions of employment (Article 15 of LS Act) and preparation of payroll books (Article 108 of LS Act). Violations numbering 211 were those relevant to safety and health; operation leader (Article 22 of the Industrial Safety and Health Act, and Article 9 of the Ionizing Radiation Ordinance for Decontamination) and implementation of special medical examination (Article 22 of the said Act and Article 20 of said Ordinance).
The Fukushima Prefectural Labour Bureau investigated the claim and the violation against the Labour Standard Act as a response to the media news indicating that some of employers forced their workers not to reveal about non-payment of decontamination allowance at the time when the Labour Standards Inspection Office, under the jurisdiction of the Fukushima Prefectural Labour Bureau, implemented supervision/instructions to decontamination sites on November and December 2012.
As a result, the Labour Standard Inspectors confirmed that: some employers explained or directed workers to tell not the spendable income but gross base wage; some employers forced workers to tell that they received a decontamination allowance even though they had not explained that they were eligible to receive the decontamination allowance. It should be noted that there were no cases in which employers replied falsely.
For these violations, corrective recommendations were issued to those employers for violation with respect to clear indication of wages and other conditions of employment, and a deduction of accommodation costs from the wage.
Based on the results described above, the Fukushima Prefectural Labour Bureau will request to the primary contractors who are implementing decontamination works to observe the Labour Standards Act and other relevant laws, focusing particularly on provisions to which many violations were found, such as clear indication of wages and other conditions of employment and payment of wages.
Office
|
Address
|
Phone
|
Jurisdiction area
|
---|---|---|---|
Fukushima Prefectural Labour Bureau |
Fukushima government office complex 5F Kasumi-town 1-46, Fukushima-city, Zip:960-8021 |
024-536-4602 (Inspection Division) |
|
Fukushima | Fukushima government office complex 1F Kasumi-town 1-46, Fukushima-city, Zip:960-8021 | 024-536-4610 | Fukushima-city, Nihonmatsu-city, Date-city, Date-county, Soma-county Iitate-village |
Koriyama | Kuwano 2-1-18, Koriyama-city Zip:963-8025 | 024-922-1370 | Koriyama-city, Tamura-city, Motomiya-city, Tamura-county, Adachi-county |
Iwaki | Iwaki local government office complex 4F Doune-town 4-11, Taira, Iwaki-city, Zip:970-8026 | 0246-23-2255 | Iwaki-city |
Aizu | Shiromae 2-10, Aizuwakamatsu-city, Zip:965-0803 | 0242-26-6494 | Aizuwakamatsu-city, Onuma-county,Minamiaizu-county, Yama-county (Inawashiro-town, Bandai-town), Kawanuma-county |
Shirakawa | Kakunai 1-124, Shirakawa-city, 961-0074 | 0248-24-1391 | Shirakawa-city, Nishishirakawa-county, Higashishirakawa-county |
Sukagawa | Asahi-town 204-1, Sukagawa-city,Zip:962-0834 | 0248-75-3519 | Sukagawa-city, Iwase-county, Ishikawa-county |
Kitakata | Suwa 91, Kitakata-city, Zip:966-0896 | 0241-22-4211 | Kitakata-city, Yama-county (Nishi-aizu-town, Kita-shiobara-village) |
Soma | Sakuragaoka 68, Nakamura, Soma-city, Zip:976-0042 | 0244-36-4175 | Soma-city, Minamisoma-city, Soma-county Shinchi-town |
Tomioka | LATOV Building 8F Tamachi 120, Taira, Iwaki-city, Zip:970-8026 | 0246-35-0050 | Hutaba-county |
Jan.- June, 2013
|
Total
(Apr 2012 – June 2013) |
|
---|---|---|
No. of supervised employers | 388 | 630 |
No. of violators | 264 | 372 |
Violation rate | 68.0% | 59.0% |
No. of cases of violation | 684 | 903 |
Violations relevant to conditions of employment
|
473 | 512 |
Violations relevant to safety and health
|
211 | 391 |
Jan.- June, 2013
|
Total
(Apr 2012 – June 2013) |
|
---|---|---|
Clear identification of wages and other conditions of employment (Article 15 of LS Act) | 82 | 93 |
Non-payment of wage (Article 24 of LS Act) | 67 | 73 |
Deduction of social party fee, accommodation cost or food
consumption without a
labour-management agreement
|
36 | 38 |
No payment of wages for the hours spent for the monitoring of
internal exposure
|
6 | 9 |
No payment of wages for the hours spent for special education
|
16 | 20 |
Working hours (Article 32 of LS Act) | 53 | 57 |
Payment of increased wages (Article 37 of LS Act) | 108 | 110 |
Preparation of lists of workers (Article 107 of LS Act) | 52 | 59 |
Preparation of payroll books (Article 108 of LS Act) | 90 | 97 |
Jan.- June, 2013
|
Total
(Apr 2012 – June 2013) |
||
---|---|---|---|
Art.22 of SH Act |
Dose Measurement (Article 5 of the Ionizing Radiation Ordinance for Decontamination) | 13 | 21 |
Prior survey (Article 7 of the Ionizing Radiation Ordinance for Decontamination) | 20 | 54 | |
Operation leader (Article 14 of the Ionizing Radiation Ordinance for Decontamination) | 6 | 11 | |
Contamination survey of those leaving the contaminated area (Article 14 of the Ionizing Radiation Ordinance for Decontamination) | 14 | 31 | |
Contamination survey of articles taken out from the contaminated area (Article 15 of Ionizing Radiation Ordinance for Decontamination) | 2 | 14 | |
Use of protecting equipment (Article 16 of Ionizing Radiation Ordinance for Decontamination) | 7 | 16 | |
Provision of radiation measurement devices (Article 26 of Ionizing Radiation Ordinance for Decontamination) | 0 | 8 | |
Art. 59 of SH Act | Implementation of special education (Article 19 of Ionizing Radiation Ordinance for Decontamination) | 16 | 30 |
Art. 66 of SH Act |
Implementation of special medical examination (Article 20 of Ionizing Radiation Ordinance for Decontamination) | 8 | 29 |
An increase in the number of violations related to conditions of employment can be observed in the data published this month (for the period from January – June 2013). This may be because the investigations were focused on conditions of employment such as clear indication of conditions of employment, payment of wage, and working hours. A lot of inquiries were provided about wage and other conditions of employment, particularly for workers on special duty (decontamination) allowance since November 2012.