The Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry is planning to tighten and enforce the country's guidelines for harassment in the workplace, the ministry announced in early November.
Revising the Equal Employment Opportunity Law this year and enforcing the changes from July 2014 will be welcome news to the many employees who suffer from workplace harassment and discrimination.
The proposed improvements to current guidelines will help to establish better relations within workplaces. The new guidelines include a reconsideration of harassment between members of the same gender. A female supervisor talking to a female subordinate will no longer be able to make comments such as, "Why aren't you married yet?" or "When are you going to have children?" Under the new guidelines, such comments will be considered harassment.