Premier to Head Pension Reform Panel

Daily Yomiuri Online

Japan

October 10, 2007

The government said Tuesday it had officially decided to set up a ministerial council this month to be led by Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda to tackle pension-related issues, including the pension record-keeping blunder. 

In their policy platforms, the government and ruling parities have pledged to complete work to identify holders of about 50 million misplaced pension accounts by the end of March. As part of this, the government appears to have found it necessary to tackle the various pension issues as a whole. 

"Resolving the problems of the pension record-keeping errors requires cooperation from all relevant ministries and agencies," Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura said at a press conference Tuesday. 

Machimura said the government aimed to push pension reforms comprehensively, such as by establishing a new pension scheme. 

In addition to the prime minister, chief cabinet secretary and health, labor and welfare minister, members of the envisaged council are expected to include the finance minister; economy, trade and industry minister; justice minister; and education, science and technology minister. 

The government also said it intends to set up a working-level subordinate panel that will comprise officials of relevant ministries and agencies, as well as experts from the private sector. 

According to government officials, for the time being, the ministerial council plans to discuss how to complete name-identifying work by March. The council will also discuss how to coordinate budgets, and look into various other pension issues, such as the development of an online pension system that the government aims to launch as early as January 2011 and measures to deal with lawsuits over the record blunders. 

In light of this, Health, Labor and Welfare Minister Yoichi Masuzoe said Monday: "The health minister and the Social Insurance Agency alone can't cope with the problem, which has gone beyond the realm of one ministry. So unless the government and private sector pitch in, it can't be solved." 
The Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry already has formed several expert panels to deal with specific pension issues. 

The government has pledged to identify holders of the 50 million accounts by looking through records on the SIA computer system, and aims to contact possible holders by late March. But such a search reportedly requires the development of a new program. Masuzoe has voiced his hope to launch the program in December. 

However, the SIA said last month that about 5.24 million of the 50 million pension accounts had no record of the holders' names. It therefore remains unclear whether the government can finish identifying the holders' names by March. 
 

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