Japan Press Weekly

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2017 May 31 - June 6 [LABOR]

Teachers’ union survey: More than 30% of pregnant teachers hesitate to take maternity leave

A field survey conducted by a teachers’ union showed that more than three out of ten pregnant teachers face “difficulty” taking maternity and childcare leave.

The All Japan Teachers and Staff Union (Zenkyo) on June 5 held a press conference in Tokyo and released a report of the “field survey of pregnancy, childbirth and childcare in 2016” carried out between June and November last year.

According to the survey, 35.1% of teachers find it “difficult” to take a leave of absence for pregnancy or childcare. As the main reasons for this, the following answers were given: “because of heavy workload” (79.7%), and “because of the unavailability of hiring substitute teacher” (25.7%).

It is also found that 25.5 percent of young teachers are not even aware of the public support system relating to pregnancy or childrearing.

A Zenkyo officer pointed out that these reasons given lead to “maternity harassment” at the workplace.

The officer also stated that Zenkyo will call on the government to increase the number of teachers, require the use of relief teachers, and conduct investigations regarding actual availability of temporary substitute teachers.