◆What are the points of concern?
The “FY2021 Local Labor Administration Operation Policy” has been formulated to show the trend of future supervision and guidance policies by the Labor Standards Inspection Offices. Let’s take a look at the points of interest.
◆Support for the maintenance and continuation of employment
After the emergency response period to the new Corona, the center of gravity of policy seems to be shifting to post-Corona.
It says that the company will support the use of enrolled secondments and outplacement support using subsidies for stable industrial employment and trial employment. It will be important to confirm employee’s intentions regarding the secondment contract and secondment.
◆Promotion of women’s participation and advancement and men’s use of childcare leave, etc.
The number of companies obligated to formulate action plans under the Act on Promotion of Women’s Participation and Advancement in the Workplace has been expanded to 101 or more employees from this April. In addition, the so-called male version of the maternity leave system (the main pillar of which is to allow male employees to take four weeks off during the first eight weeks after the birth of a child) is scheduled to be newly established, and the system is scheduled to come into effect in the fall of 2022.
◆Telework and work-related injury
It seems that efforts are being stepped up for telework, which has now become a matter of course. There is support through subsidies for securing human resources. Telework will become essential knowledge for HR managers, both from a technical standpoint and in terms of people management such as working hour management and health management.
It is also important to be aware of work-related injuries caused by the new corona infection. There have been cases where workers’ compensation due to corona has been recognized not only for medical-related occupations, but also for cleaners in the building maintenance industry, construction managers, salespeople and construction workers, port cargo handlers, and sales clerks.
Although supervision and guidance are mainly related to the correction of long working hours, this year’s management policy also mentions workplace harassment, intervals between working hours, and equal pay for equal work, so we need to pay attention to investigations and guidance that reflect recent trends.
*The intervals between work hours are the way to ensure that workers have time to live and sleep by providing them with a certain amount of time to rest after work.
