Leading Coalition Reaches Majority in Lower House

Three independent members of the House of Representative announced that they would join the parliamentary group of Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) on November 28th. With the participation of those three, the leading coalition of the LDP and Japan Innovation Party (JIP) secured a simple majority in the Lower House, salvaging Sanae Takaichi administration from minority government. However, the leading coalition still in short of majority in the Upper House.

Representatives Tadashi Morishima (Osaka 2nd district), Takeshi Saiki (Hokuriku-Shin-etsu proportional district) and Hiroki Abe (Kyushu proportional district) had a meeting with LDP Secretary General, Shun-ichi Suzuki, and told that they would join LDP group. Suzuki approved their offer. They told that it would be important for the government to implement policies or budget bills with their participation.

 

The Lower House has 465 seats. The LDP had occupied 196 and JIP 34, giving the leading coalition by those two parties 230 seats, which was in short of three seats from a simple majority of 233 in the House. With participation of three members, the coalition reached a simple majority of 233 for the first time since last general election in October 2024, enabling the leading coalition to pass a budget bill or block a non-confidence resolution against Takaichi.

 

Those three lawmakers had once been affiliated to JIP. They left the party after the 2024 Lower House election, frustrated with the leadership of JIP. JIP replaced their party leaders after serious setback in the election. The three members criticized new JIP leaders as being distant from original party principles when Osaka Ishin-no Kai was established in 2010. JIP expelled those three members with accusation of defaming the party and damaging party discipline.

 

In the election for nominating a prime minister on October 4th in current extraordinary session of the Diet, those three lawmakers voted for Takaichi. There was a request of voting for Takaichi to them from LDP leaders including Vice-President Taro Aso. After the election, some LDP leaders urged them to join the group of LDP in the Lower House to construct a majority in the House.

 

Even though the leading coalition achieves a majority in the Lower House, they are still in short by six seats in the Upper House. Although the Lower House has superior power to the Upper House for non-confidence resolution or budget bill, ordinary bills, such as tax cut or possible spy prevention act needs majority in both chambers. It is inevitable for Takaichi to achieve approvals from opposition parties to pass some bills to implement her agenda.

 

JIP embraces a concern that it might be swallowed by the LDP, as it continues to cooperate in policy discussion. Some JIP lawmakers have rivalry against LDP candidate in their own electoral districts. JIP needs to secure their own members not to leave and join the LDP, like the three former members did.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

LDP Kickoffs Presidential Election

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP)   kicked off  its presidential election campaign on September 22 and five lawmakers officially submitted their candidacy to the party. Having lost majority in both Houses of the Diet under the leadership of Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, the presidential election should be about how to regain power through reform of the party. Nevertheless, the candidates do not talk much about the reform, rather focusing on economic policies for the people or maneuvers to attract the opposition parties.   Those five candidates are former Minister on Economic Security Takayuki Kobayashi, former LDP Secretary General Toshimitsu Motegi, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi, former Minister on Economic Security Sanae Takaichi and Miniser of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Shinjiro Koizumi.   Kobayashi insists on temporary income tax cut with a fixed rate, which return is bigger for high-income taxpayers than them with low-income. Identifying h...
Read more

BOJ Begins to Sell ETF

The Bank of Japan (BOJ) decided to keep its short-term rate at 0.5 percent in its Monetary Policy Meeting on September 19 th . While it had been expected that the bank would not change the policy rate in the meeting, the meeting unanimously agreed on beginning to sell exchange-traded funds (ETF). Although the policy reflected the bank’s determination for normalizing its monetary policy, the Governor of JOB, Kazuo Ueda, predicted that it would take a hundred years to release all the ETF it possesses. While the BOJ started buying ETF, a financial product which is equivalent to investment trust, in 2010, the bank abruptly increased its quantity of purchase in 2013, under the leadership of then governor, Haruhiko Kuroda, who exchanged an accord with Shinzo Abe administration to cooperate to get rid of deflation and to achieve stable economic growth. The amount of ETF bought by the BOJ has reached 37 trillion yen.   Purchase of ETF by a central bank has been recognized as a prohibited m...
Read more

Contaminated Soil to Prime Minister’s Residence

Shigeru Ishiba Cabinet discussed how the radioactively contaminated soil in Fukushima prefecture would be treated and decided some of it should be used in Prime Minister’s Official Residence in Tokyo. Although the soil needs to be removed from Fukushima with legal requirement, the government of Japan has not found anywhere it should go. Ishiba administration hopes that the decision will pave the way for any local community to accept the soil.   Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant emitted a huge amount of radiation into the air, which contaminated the land surface around the site, in the severe accident in East Japan Great Earthquake in 2011. The contaminated soil in Fukushima prefecture was stocked in the intermediate stockyard built in the towns of Futaba and Okuma, where the power plant is located. The government promised the people in Fukushima to remove the soil out of Fukushima prefecture within thirty years, when it decided to build the stockyard in 2014.   The total a...
Read more