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Japan – Recruitment boss arrested for supplying illegal foreign workers

28 July 2014

The head of an unnamed recruitment company in the southern Japanese Hyogo Prefecture region has been arrested for illegally arranging factory jobs for foreign workers without visas, reports kyodonews.jp.  

Chiyokazu Kunimoto, 51, was arrested after allegedly arranging for three Vietnamese nationals to work at a mobile phone assembly factory last year, but police said the number of illegal workers he helped could total several hundred.

The arrest comes after police found around 50 illegally employed foreigners during a factory raid in June. The workers have been reported to the Immigration Bureau.

The tightness of the labour market has meant that companies and recruitment firms are more desperate to find workers. It is highly likely that the increased pressure on recruiters is why Mr Kunimoto resorted to supplying undocumented workers.  

Japan’s labour market has been showing some signs of improvement in recent months, but companies are still struggling to recruit. In May there were 109 jobs available for every 100 jobseekers. Unemployment in Japan in May was 3.5%, down from 3.6% in April and down from 3.9% in May 2013.

A proposal to increase the number of immigrants permitted to work in Japan was recently rejected. Instead, in his June growth strategy, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe expanded a foreign trainee scheme, which accounts for less than 0.3% of Japanese workers. He is also encouraging greater workforce participation by women and the elderly, but critics say these measures will never be enough.