Transport Workers Solidarity Committee

JAL labor unions seek strength through mergers in face of massive layoffs

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20100422p2a00m0na022000c.html
JAL labor unions seek strength through mergers in face of massive layoffs

Four of Japan Airlines' (JAL) labor unions have decided to merge into two larger bodies in a bid to enhance their influence over management as the airline moves to make drastic cuts to its workforce.

The JAL Flight Crew Union and the Japan Airlines Domestic Pilot Union, consisting of some 1,100 JAL and 670 former JAS pilots, respectively, plan to consolidate on June 1. Similarly, the Japan Airlines Labor Union and the Japan Airlines Domestic Labor Union, comprised of approximately 70 JAL and 650 former JAS ground staff, respectively, are scheduled to merge by the end of June.

Both flight crew and ground staff unions will hold separate extraordinary conventions in May, and begin preparing for the planned consolidations.

Currently, JAL has a total of eight labor unions, including the largest JAL Labor Union, as a result of a series of labor-management confrontations and the merger between JAL and JAS in 2002, leading to criticism that the complex relationshi

Don’t put off the fire of the struggle of 1047 dismissed national railway workers!
The Struggle against the Division and Privatization of National Railway is not yet finished.
Doro-Chiba’s opinion on the “Reconciliation Plan of the 1047 workers’ issue”
April 9, 2010
Doro-Chiba
(1)
An attempt of “Reconciliation” is under way on the issue of dismissed 1047 national railway workers between the government - the Railway Transportation Organization and the Four Bodies and Four Organizations. Three governing parties and the New Komei Party have reached an agreement on the “Settlement Plan” to be proposed to the unions and/or organizations concerned.
We must clarify that Doro-Chiba, one of the concerned unions on this issue, is excluded from all these procedures. We have not been informed at all. As we learned from the report by mass medias, this “Reconciliation Plan” includes no apology for the unjust dismissal of national railway workers or withdrawal of the dismissal. Instead, it offers a certain sum of money and justifies the unfair labor practice committed by the state on the occasion of the Division and Privatization of National Railway (in 1987). We condemn this plan as an outrageous offense on 1047 dismissed workers who have been fighting for their reinstatement for their lives.

End to long JR dispute inspires mixed feelings-"Murky Political Settlement"?
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T100410002432.htm

End to long JR dispute inspires mixed feelings "Murky Political Settlement"?
The Yomiuri Shimbun

Former national railway workers have mixed feelings about Friday's settlement of a 23-year-old dispute over Japan Railway companies' refusal to hire them when Japanese National Railways was privatized in 1987.

"Sixty of our coworkers have passed away. I deeply regret I can't share the joy of the resolution with them, but we can embark on a new chapter in our lives," Shinji Takahashi, chairman of the National Railway Workers Union (Kokuro), said Friday during a press conference at the union's headquarters in Shimbashi, Tokyo.

Takahashi also said Kokuro would seek to reach an agreement with the JR companies over the issue of reemployment, through labor-management talks.

"I want each JR firm to hire [union members] from a humanitarian point of view," he said.

After JNR was privatized in 1987, JR companies did not hire a total of 1,047 JNR workers. Because 966 of them were Kokuro members, the union said they had been discriminated against. An executive of East Japan Railway Co. said he felt strange about the government's proposal to pay an average settlement of 22 million yen per person. Now in his 50s, he remembers when about 70,000 workers left the railway industry at the time of the privatization.

Three Japan Rail West ex-presidents to be charged over crash that killed 107
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20100327a3.html
Saturday, March 27, 2010

Three JR West ex-presidents to be charged over crash
KOBE (Kyodo) Three former presidents of West Japan Railway Co. will be charged with negligence in connection with a 2005 train derailment that killed 107 people, an independent judicial panel ruled Friday.

The decision, the second, by the Kobe No. 1 Committee for the Inquest of Prosecution paves the way for Masataka Ide, 74, Shojiro Nanya, 68, and Takeshi Kakiuchi, 65, to be charged with professional negligence resulting in death and injury.

Ide served as adviser, Nanya as chairman and Kakiuchi as president of JR West at the time the Fukuchiyama Line express train, exceeding the speed limit, jumped the tracks on a curve and slammed into a high-rise condominium complex, claiming the lives of 106 passengers and the driver and leaving 562 other passengers injured.

Under the revised inquest of prosecution law that came into force last May, indictments will be automatic if an inquest panel decides twice that the accused should be charged. A court-appointed lawyer will act as prosecutor and file criminal charges against the three.

900 axed Japan JNR rail unionists may get ¥29.5 million each in new deal
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20100225a2.html

Thursday, Feb. 25, 2010

900 axed JNR unionists may get ¥29.5 million each
Kyodo News
A 23-year-old dispute over the dismissal of unionized workers at the Japanese National Railways may finally be heading toward a resolution now that the ruling bloc and an opposition party have drafted a ¥27 billion settlement plan.

The package, hammered out Tuesday by the three coalition partners andNew Komeito, calls for a payment of ¥29.5 million each to about 900 former JNR workers who have sued over their dismissal and asks the current Japan Railway companies to hire about 230 of them who are 55 years old or younger, according to sources.

In exchange, the workers will drop their lawsuits.

The proposed ¥27 billion payout would be undertaken by the Japan Railway Construction, Transport and Technology Agency, an independent administrative agency that inherited JNR's debts after it was privatized and split up in 1987.

Representatives of the railway agency and the National Railway Workers Union, known as Kokuro, are expected to sign a compromise deal based on the package, the sources said.

Japan Airlines to file for bankruptcy protection
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8466997.stm

Page last updated at 05:34 GMT, Tuesday, 19 January 2010

Japan Airlines to file for bankruptcy protection

The company has lost billions in market value over the past week
Japan Airlines (JAL), Asia's biggest air carrier, is due to file for bankruptcy protection, reports say.
JAL - which has $16.5bn (£10bn) of debts - is expected to make the move after a board meeting later on Tuesday.
JAL shares fell to an all-time low on Monday, valuing the firm at just $150m - roughly the price of a new jumbo jet.
Japan's government says flights will continue as normal as JAL begins restructuring under the supervision of a state-backed turnaround organisation.
A third of JAL's workforce - more than 15,000 people - are expected to lose their jobs, the BBC's Roland Buerk in Tokyo says.
Banks will have to write off unsecured debt and JAL will receive an injection of taxpayers' money, our correspondent adds.
While the turnaround plan backed by the government will see the airline continue to fly, investors in the company are likely to lose most of their money.
Along with other major global airlines, JAL has been hit hard by falling passenger numbers during the global downturn.

JAL to cut 15,600 jobs, reject cash bids
http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20100111p2g00m0bu003000c.html

JAL to cut 15,600 jobs, reject cash bids

TOKYO (AP) -- Troubled Japan Airlines Corp. is set to cut about 15,600 jobs, a third of its work force, and reject billion-dollar cash offers from Delta and American Airlines, as it files for bankruptcy and embarks on a government-led turnaround, reports said Monday.

Under a rehabilitation plan now being hammered out by a state-backed corporate turnaround body, JAL would make the job cuts during the three fiscal years through March 2013. The plan would include a fresh investment of 300 billion yen ($3.3 billion) by the body and wipe much of its soaring debts under bankruptcy protection.

Officials at JAL, the transport ministry and the turnaround body could not be reached for comment Monday, a national holiday in Japan. The stock market was also closed.

The state-backed Enterprise Turnaround Initiative Corp. of Japan will decline cash offers from Delta and American Airlines as it fears giving foreign carriers a foreign stake in the company would complicate the restructuring, according to media reports.

Instead, the airline will pursue only greater cooperation with either Delta or American, the business daily Nikkei said Sunday. The turnaround body will pick one of the U.S. carriers as JAL's partner after February, it said.

JAL's biggest union to accept massive benefit cuts
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20091230n1.html

Wednesday, Dec. 30, 2009

JAL's biggest union to accept massive benefit cuts
Compiled from Kyodo, Bloomberg
The leadership of the largest labor union of Japan Airlines Corp. plans to accept a company proposal to cut pension benefits substantially to help the ailing airline turn itself around, according to union sources.

The 9,500-strong union, known as JAL Friendship & Improvement Organization, or JALFIO, reached the decision because changing thepension system is "a necessary step" at present, and cuts in benefits would help the recovery of the airline, which is "the source of welfare," the sources said.

The decision is expected to influence individual union members. Members will still decide for themselves whether to vote for or against the cuts, said Hideshi Takahashi, general secretary of the union.

Earlier this month, two of JAL's other unions also agreed to pension cuts. The airline has eight unions.

Japan's top airline, suffering from heavy losses, has sent out letters to its retirees and current workers to seek their approval for cuts to their pension benefits and is expected to receive their replies by Jan. 12.

Outsourcing of yard operation and inspection and repair work will cause the second and third Amagasaki rail accidents!
Stop such outrageous attempts!

It’s quite outrageous to practice total outsourcing of yard operation and inspection and repair work. It should not happen. If such an attempt is practiced, rail safety will collapse. The second and third Amagasaki rail accidents would be inevitable in the metropolitan areas.
The JR (Japan Railway) Company is going to abandon technological as well as business capacity indispensable for a railway company. The targets of outsourcing are: maintenance, inspection and repair work of vehicles, tracks, signals, communication and power systems, building works, station works, etc. All of these skills proper to the railroad and historical achievement for hundred and scores of years are going to be hastily abandoned by outsourcing.

JR is no longer “railway company”;
The JR Company is going to stop to be a railway company. A medium term business scheme in November 2000 titled “New Frontier 21” was the promoter of today’s outsourcing policy.
It stated as follows: “The time has come when the severe market principle, the principle of survival of the fittest and self-responsibility prevail in the society.” “This reform is the only way for corporations to survive and for the employees and their families to realize their happiness even though it will be accompanied by hardship and pain”. It was to be materialized in the “business strategy” that comprises:

http://www.asahi.com/english/Herald-asahi/TKY200912050155.html

No charges again for ex-JR West chiefs
THE ASAHI SHIMBUN

2009/12/5PrintShare Article
KOBE--Prosecutors on Friday decided for the second time not to indict three former West Japan Railway Co. presidents over the April 2005 train derailment that killed 107 people.

Prosecutors said Masataka Ide, Shojiro Nanya and Takeshi Kakiuchi were not aware of the dangers of the curve on the JR Takarazuka Line where the accident took place.

However, the three will be forcibly indicted by a court-designated lawyer if eight or more members of an 11-member inquest committee decide they should be indicted.

The panel concluded in October that the three should be charged with professional negligence resulting in death and injury on the grounds that they failed to order the installation of a new automatic train stop system.(IHT/Asahi: December 5,2009)