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On October 11, the secretaries general and Diet affairs chiefs of the DPJ, the Japan Restoration Party, Your Party, the Japanese Communist Party, the People's Life Party, the Social Democratic Party and the New Renaissance Party held a meeting at a Tokyo venue, and agreed to liaise and work together with regard to issues such as contaminated water at Fukushima No. 1 and the TPP negotiations during the Diet session scheduled to start from October 15.
DPJ Secretary General Akihiro Ohata reported on the content of the three-party meeting between the secretaries general of the LDP, New Komeito and the DPJ held on September 30. He laid out a basic game plan for the forthcoming Diet session, calling for the opposition parties to cooperate on those points of policy and Diet affairs where they were in agreement and for more limited cooperation between those parties in agreement when unanimous agreement could not be reached between all parties.
Pertaining in particular to the TPP, the opposition decried the fact that the government had said prior to entering into negotiations that they would disclose information to the Japanese people, but despite this had not disclosed one iota of information as of this time. They agreed to call for the establishment of a Special Diet Committee on the TPP, and to urge proper disclosure of information regard the content of negotiations to the public.
With regard to leaks of contaminated water, they took the view that this was an extremely serious state of affairs, and agreed that the opposition parties should cooperate together and join in proceeding with a properly thought out response on the matter.
Regarding the reduction in the number of Diet members and reform of the Diet, various parties voiced the opinion that this should be discussed not just in three-party talks between the LDP, New Komeito and the DPJ, but participation should be widened to include all parties. Ohata agreed with this opinion and said he would convey it to the ruling parties. This article is based on an explanation given to the press by Ohata following the meeting.
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