JCP Miyamoto urges government to make high schools tuition-free without delay

Japan Press Weekly

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JCP Miyamoto urges government to make high schools tuition-free without delay

Pointing out that only Japan and three other countries among 30 member nations of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) levy tuition fees for public high schools, Japanese Communist Party member of the House of Representatives Miyamoto Takeshi urged the government to make high schools tuition-free without delay.

At the House of Representative’s Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Committee meeting on November 18, Education Minister Kawabata Tatsuo replied, “In order to make public high schools tuition-free from next April, I will put the matter on the table.”

Under the severe economic situation, the National Federation of Private School Teachers and Staffs Union’s (Shikyoren) survey showed that as of September 30, those who are in arrears with private high school tuition fees for more than three months reached a record-high of 4,587 students. In addition, 149 private high school students gave up going to school due to financial difficulties between April and September alone.

Miyamoto called on the government to examine the JCP proposal that students in private high schools whose household income is less than five million yen should be exempted from payment of tuition fees, and those whose household income is less than eight million yen should have their tuition fees reduced by half.

Government examines withdrawal of its suspension of provision in International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights

Regarding the issue that the Japanese government has suspended the provision in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) calling for free secondary and higher education, Education Minister Kawabata Tatsuya on November 18 said, “I want to move ahead on measures to withdraw the suspension of the provision.”

This was in answer to JCP member of the House of Representatives Miyamoto Takeshi’s question.

Paragraph 2 of Article 9 of the ICESCR states that free education should be progressively introduced into secondary and higher education. As of May, only Japan and Madagascar among the ratifying countries have suspended the provision. In 2001, the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in its recommendation urged the Japanese government to scrap its suspension of the provision.

- Akahata, November 19, 2009