| 18 January 2003 |
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I.Overview - Revitalization of Japan by returning to the Party's initial aspiration of changing government
Our country is facing its biggest crises in the post-war period: economic stagnation, uncertainty in employment and the future, an increase in crimes and violence, problems in education, mounting problems in foreign and security policy, and so on and so forth.
In this situation, the Koizumi Administration has spent the first year and 9 months without achieving any real results. We hear Prime Minister Koizumi's call for reform, but he has failed to show his leadership in critical circumstances and has not been able to present even a direction to the exit from the current situation.
There has been the issue of bad loans, structural reforms of the Public Roads Administration and other institutions, tax reforms, fiscal reforms, the issue of politics and money, etc. His initial words on these critical tasks have been mitigated through a series of compromises with the "resistance forces" within the Liberal Democratic Party, and the reform has not shown any progress. The root cause of the problems lies in the old political characteristics of the LDP based on the traditional triangle of politics, administration and industry, which is incompetent in answering the people's requirements. Getting rid of this regime is the only way for Japan to open its prospects into the future.
However, in this critical situation, the people's trust in politics is diminishing further because of continuous scandals involving politicians and now the raison d'etre of political parties, which constitutes the basis of our democracy, is in question.
In these circumstances, we need to seriously ponder upon the very regrettable fact that the DPJ has not lived up to the people's expectations as a core opposition party and has not been able to gain their trust as a next ruling party.
Our party has been losing its support rapidly since the second half of last year. To overcome this biggest crisis for the Party and restore public support, we need to return to our starting point.
Namely, we need to reconfirm that there will be no real reform and revitalization of Japan without a change of power, the DPJ is the only party that can bring about a change of power and we need to commit ourselves to realizing this goal.
I see our concrete tasks as follows. First of all, in the coming Diet session, we are going to expose the fact that the Koizumi Administration has been betraying the people's expectations, and we are going to present our clear visions to the public. We are going to attack the Koizumi Administration's procrastination and bad handling of important issues such as economic policies, employment, public health, pension, foreign policy and security related to Iraq and North Korea, etc, and present the public with a DPJ that is an alternative to the Koizumi government to realize the peace and stability of Japan and the world, a revitalization of the Japanese economy and the security of peoples' lives.
Thus, it is very important to make clear our basic stance that the DPJ represents the positions of the general public, taxpayers and consumers. As the environments of our society are rapidly changing with issues such as aging and declining birth rates, globalization and informatization, etc, we are going to present our bold policies to build a new society in which people can live lives full of vitality with a sense of security.
Secondly, we are going to advance our party reform so that the people will understand that the DPJ is a party that they can trust with government of the country. The introduction of the external financial audit that we proposed in this Party Congress is one example. We need to create a new culture in this party by reforming.
Thirdly, we are going to make all out efforts to win in the local elections in the coming spring, the following by-elections and the expected general elections. It is necessary to establish broad cooperation with the Liberal Party and the Social Democrats especially for the general elections. Needless to say, the strengthening of support for new candidates is also our urgent task.
II. Square Confrontation with the Koizumi Cabinet and the LDP
1.Comprehensible policymaking and legislation
It has become apparent that the Koizumi reform is nothing more than a slogan. His administration has actually been introducing measures unfavorable to employment and small enterprises, and increasing public burdens concerning health care and unemployment insurance. It has also become obvious that the administration is very reluctant to advance political reforms including investigations of political scandals.
We will expose the real picture of the Koizumi Cabinet. We will strengthen our efforts in policy proposals and lawmaker-initiated legislations and make them more foresighted, intelligible and distinct from those of the LDP
2.Development of the Next Cabinet
The number of lawmaker-initiated legislations by the DPJ, including those in the pipeline, is approaching one hundred. We will further strengthen these capabilities. We will seek to strengthen the functions of the Next Cabinet. According to the Party regulations, the Next Cabinet is a policy decision-making body next to the Permanent Board, and we will strengthen its policy discussions with the parliamentary members, party departments and locals.
We will improve departmental meetings, meetings of first deputy ministers and the Next Cabinet by making them more efficient and full of contents, by making clearer the directions of their opinions and positions, thus allowing them to conduct more comprehensible legislative and policy activities.
In addition, we will continue joint works with research institutions and experts outside the Party.
3.Public Relations Activities
The DPJ exercises the ability to produce policies and legislations, which far excel others in the history of Japanese political parties. Our important task is that all our diet members and our branches all over the country will share the effort and improve the system and ability of introducing our policies to the people. We will facilitate works of the Public Relations Committee, promote the utilization of e-mails and the Internet, and take a more positive approach to our relations with the mass media.
4.Priority tasks
1)Measures for employment and support for small and middle size enterprises to achieve economic recovery, improvement of the quality of life
If we neglect current economic situations, Japan will inevitably head into a serious economic crisis. In cooperation with other opposition parties, we will increase our efforts in hammering out and realizing our proposals concerning the FY 2002 additional supplementary budget and the FY 2005 annual budget. We will put measures to cope with the bad loans issue and anti-deflation efforts at the center of economic policies, and also make utmost efforts to cope with unemployment, support small and medium size enterprises, entrepreneurship and job-creation.
2)Active Development of Foreign and Security Policy
Japan is facing mounting and urgent foreign policy issues: negotiations with North Korea, solution to the kidnapping of Japanese citizens, North Korea's development of weapons of mass destruction, the peace process in the Middle East, Iraq, etc. We will further develop our discussion and clarify our positions on important issues that can mark turning points in our national security policy, namely, activities of the Self Defense Forces under the Anti-terrorists Special Act and bills related to emergency situations including the protection of human rights.
3)Promotion of Human Rights Protection
The bills on the protection of individual information and on the protection of human rights remain under heated discussion. The DPJ continues to promote human rights protection by advocating the protection of information on individuals, freedom of speech and appropriate management of individual information by the government and corporations.
4)Measures to cope with important urgent issues
We will make efforts to cope with urgent issues such as reform of the Public Roads Corporation and other government corporations, revitalization of the industry, reform of civil service workers and the issue of labor rights, strengthening of support to NPOs, fundamental reform of the pension system, legislation of labor laws, improvement of nursing care insurance, review of the Basic Law on Education, promotion of decentralization and local fiscal issues, a new approach to social capital development and public enterprises, food security, environmental education, etc.
5)Promotion of political reform
We will promote political reform including an amendment of the Political Contributions Regulation Law to ban contributions from companies engaged in public projects and a fundamental strengthening of the law regulating political mediation.
6)Blossoming of local autonomies and decentralization
We will have nationwide local elections in 2003. At these very important elections that will show the direction of local autonomies and decentralization in the 21 century, we will advocate the decentralization of authorities and budgets and further decentralization polities. We will also promote reforms in local governments and advance reform practices throughout Japan.
5.Policy making attentive to regional voices
To improve DPJ policies and legislations based on regional voices and public voices, we will further proceed with the organization of the "Next Cabinet regional sessions," symposiums and "On-line public policy initiatives." We will work on the "Regional Next Cabinet" to attach greater importance to regional voices and DPJ officially recognized candidates, as well as making it more compact so that we can hold it more often in many regions.
6.Policy cooperation among oppositions and other organizations
We will strengthen cooperation among the four opposition parties including the improvement of regular policy consultations, cooperation on the Private Information Bills, proposals for review of the budget bill, the public interest disclosure bill and the political reform related bills.
We will also pursue improvement of policy consultations with unions and develop joint cooperative efforts on policies with economic organizations and NPOs.
7.Policy relations and exchanges with foreign countries
In FY 2002, we have conducted exchange with friendly parties in South Korea and other countries, sent an environmental fact finding mission to Mongolia and held research sessions with experts from Britain and Germany. We will promote exchanges with South Korea, study the possibility of sending our policy research teams to Europe and advance policy exchange activities with foreign countries.
III. Make debate in the Diet more comprehensible and vigorous
1. Strengthen functions of the legislative body
The most important issue of the coming 156th ordinary session of the Diet is the problem of economic stagnation. A number of urgent issues are piling up. There are financial issues such as bad-loans disposal, enterprises management improvement and employment issues. The DPJ will endeavor to strengthen the legislative body functions.
2. Improve the budget discussion
Like last year, the government is going to submit a supplementary budget for FY 2002 at the beginning of the Diet ordinary session. However, the concrete picture of the "Comprehensive Economic Measures," which the government adopted last autumn is still not clear, as the government has been postponing the implementation of their contents. At the budget deliberations, we will strictly correct the government's lack of policy and while strongly pursuing the drastic strengthening of employment measures and the establishment of measures for small and very small companies, we will strictly pursue the Koizumi Administration's responsibility for its failure in the economic management that has led to the vast revenue deficit.
We will increase the number of question time sessions and will fill it with solid contents.
3. Proposal and control over Foreign Affairs and Security issues
Japan -North Korea negotiations on the resolution to the abduction cases and allegations of nuclear development are coming to an important conjuncture. There is the possibility that the Iraqi issue will show new development by the end of January. All these subjects are very important issues for maintaining peace and stability of the international community, as well as in their influence over Asia and Japan. Through discussions in the Diet, the DPJ is going to take an active approach and exercise strict control over government diplomacy.
4. Protect Human rights and the peoples' lives
In the next session of parliament, three important bills will become the focal point of discussion. These are the "Bill to Respond to Armed Attacks," "Bill on Private Information Protection" and "Civil Rights Protection Bill." Many questions remain concerning these bills such that we cannot allow them to be adopted in the state they have been submitted by the government. The DPJ, based on the discussions at last year's ordinary and extraordinary diet sessions, will strive for more active discussion and proposal activities.
Furthermore, important legislative items such as the "Industrial Revitalization Institute Bill," "amendments to the Fundamental Law of Education," "reform of the civil service system" and "public corporations reform" are going to become a new heavier burden on the people. The DPJ taking the position of the working people, taxpayers and consumers will promote active deliberations on these important items on the agenda.
5. Promote joint struggle of opposition
As mentioned above, to take a sufficient approach to a Diet session that is mounting with important issues, as the number one opposition party, the DPJ will be strengthening its cooperative relationships with other opposition parties inside the House and reserving enough deliberation time via different committees for plenary sessions, the budget committee, as well as for party leaders debate. It will firmly confront the Koizumi Administration through invigoration of the Diet discussion.
IV. Getting ready for the elections to take over power
2. Directions of activities toward victory in the general elections
We will nominate strong candidates and prepare the party to win in the 43rd general elections of the House of Representatives whatever the political situations in 2003 may be.
1) Finalization of nomination of candidates for the general elections
The Party Central Election Committee and prefectural party bodies will urgently nominate our candidates in more than 250 districts.
Based on the open candidate recruitment that we conducted last year, we will try to name candidates from various backgrounds. We will also try to increase our female candidates under the philosophy of gender equality.
2) Strengthening of support to the candidates
We will advance measures to support our candidates such as the organization of campaign trails by party leaders, seminars for candidates, financial support, information support, etc.
3) Preparation in regions and wide cooperation
We will help district party organs to prepare themselves so that they can conduct activities to support the candidates involving party members, members of the local assemblies and other support organizations.
We will also promote support activities at the prefectural and bloc levels through the prefectural associations and the House of Representative Bloc Councils. We will advance coordination and joint works with various outside support organizations at the central as well as prefectural levels to strengthen local cooperation with them.
3. Preparation for the elections of the House of Councilors
In preparation for the 20th elections of the House of Councilors, we will look for candidates from various backgrounds, prepare the nomination of candidates for both single and proportional representation districts, and strive to nominate candidates in all districts by the fall of 2003.
We will study effective election campaigns for the proportional representation constituencies based on the unbinding name list, and establish campaign policies that will allow the party organs, parliamentary members, members of local assemblies and support organizations to effectively and full-heartedly cooperate with one another.
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