Our Special Correspondent DAVE OSLER reports from Japan, where management lead the field in the use of tame union structures IF YOU THINK you've got it tough being a trade union activist in Britain, imagine what it's like in Japan, the country 'Japanisation' is not the latest employers' but the daily lot of the working class Before bosses at the twe nepyards in Yokosuka cotto Simone shipyards in lished a company union in 1971, the independent Zennihon Zosenkai j Roso organised the Now it's down to just 50 activists, with 1,250 in the so-called alternative.
First union As Sumitomo could not legally derecognise came nicknamed the First systematically punished supporters with pany housing and denial of recreation; with Japanese companies owning all amateur sports tacilities, milants don t even get a game of bowis on their day off.
For First Union diehards Takeo, Yoshiaki and Shin, also members of the 500,000 strong japan Communst lary. it'sa moral obligation for workers tod fight constantly for justice. Many of our workmates respect our stand, but lack the courage May 16, 1992 to join us.
The company outfit ritually demands a decent rise, a bigger bonus and reduced working hours but demanding' is where it 'They have to pretend reflect members' wishes, but in reality they ignore them. For management, it's great to have a union that Lifetime jobs mean lifetime slavery in Japan accepts everything it says.
The aprestor can eat are ston - - for jobs that are kitanai (dirty), kiken (dangerous), and kitsui (hard). This ob, the men joke, is "3K plus y'. the last standing for yasui - low paid. week is 114,000 a year after 30 for a forty hour service, Japanese industrial workers command just two thirds the purchasing sower of counterparts in the SA or western Germany Annualised hours average 2500, around ow above typical western levels. This excludes time spent in quality control (QC) circles, management pep to devise ways of working har"Thanks to criticism of Japan abroad. the government wants the 1,800 hour year in place by 1994. Kenso tune waistredi union federation) has adopted No. 21 the demand. It's not going to happen.
apan's supposed lifetime pesn't obtain in shipbuilding. The industry's workforce has been slashed from 361,000 in 1974 to around 126,000 today. At the two yards it has fallen from 4,000 to 1,300 since 1979 without a whimper from the stooges.
Despite a national labour shortage, with 125 vacancies per 100 job-seekers, middle aged unemployed industrial workers find it hard to get another job at a fair wage.
The First Union struck twice this year over pay, once for one hour and once for four. The effect on production was zero, but the outcome was symbol cally significant. In a country where rises are graduated in hundredths of a per cent, the settlement was 5.05 percent, with shipbuilding the only industry to breach the nationally Japan now builds 46 per cent of new ships in the world. But with the economy in trouble, rises elsewhere were the lowest since 1980.
The steelworks at gritty working class Kawasaki, forty minutes train ride from Tokyo, is one of the most militant workplaces in lapan. The local authority has a Socialist/Communist majority.
No alternative But things arens quite as good at the 3,500-employee suzu dumptruck plant. jCP ac livists Keni, a warehouseman, and track worker Hisao work within the company union, be cause there's no alternative.
We are ashamed to hear what western workers are told to learn' from the Japanese. Please tell British workers this -Iracy, they end up with practices, end up with poorer living standards and worse working conditions. But if Japanese practices are introduced into western companies, workers will oppose them, won't they?
At Isuzu, the 45 minute 'lunch break' routinely goes on Or saturday - theoretically a day off - is almost universally worked. Monthly basic for an worker (meticulously defined as aged 35, two dependants and with the company tor 13 years) is 61,000 a month pretax. Hino and Suzuki, apparently, are paid less.
Of the 18,000 workers in four major factories, 24 died on the job last year, with heart attacks due to the pace of work the biggest killer. Despite many accidents, only 72 people were given long term sick leave that is, more than a fortnight. This year has seen four deaths shin-Funin ('transferseparation) has entered the language.
what the union does about all this prompts laughter. the union is the company's "partner', represents management's interests. Ordinary workers expect nothing from it.
'Wecampaign hard, but there hasn't been a single Communist union rep in the whole of the Isuzu group for 15 years. If you want to stand for a position, you have to be a workplace committee delegate. To stand as a delegate you need the permission of lower management.
A JCP member with 100 per cent support in his section was recently elected unopposed; the him to another shop.
'We stand democracy candidates rather than party members, but management knows we are Communists and so do our workmates. The ballot isn't secret, so people who want to vote for us are often frightened to.' The last strike was in 1950. Industrial action is now limited to unofficial overtime boycotts or refusal to participate in the theoretically voluntary QC. Oc casionally, resolutions critical of the company union are carried. Two shops rejected this year's pay demand.
As they cannot even conceive dustrially, Kenji and Hisao look CPhas launched a major labour legislation reform campaign under the slogan, 'lives worthy of human beings'. All hopes are pinned onto the eventual emergence of an anti-LDP coalition that can be pressurised into taking up some of the demands.
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