Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto's Conference on Fiscal Structural Reform gave the go-ahead April 24 for revisions to three points of the fiscal austerity law as part of "emergency measures" to accommodate the government's economic stimulus package.
Some fundamental points of the Fiscal Structural Reform Law, which was enacted last November to provide numerical targets aimed at reducing the nation's huge fiscal deficit, will now be changed.
The most controversial point of the planned revisions is suspending in fiscal 1999 the implementation of a cap on social welfare spending that limits annual budget growth in that area to no more than 2 percent for fiscal 1999 and 2000.