1. Introduction
In this News, we will introduce the employer’s obligations for the workplace that regularly employs 50 workers or more from the point of regulations related to labor law.

2. Appointment of health officers
In the workplace regularly employing 50 workers or more, the employer must appoint at least one health officer regardless of type of business (Article 12, Industrial Safety and Health Act). The number of health officers to be appointed based on the size of the workplace is shown in Table 1. If having several workplaces employing 50 workers or more, the employer must appoint the health officer for each workplace and submit the report of appointment to the Chief of the competent Labor Standards Inspection Office.

A health officer needs a certain qualification and should be appointed from the persons with qualifications including the following:  ①health controller in health engineering’s license, ②class-1 health officer’s license, ③class-2 health officer’s license, ④a physician or dentist, ⑤an industrial health consultant, etc. The person with a qualification of class-2 health officer’s license can be appointed only at workplaces except for certain outdoor and industrial business.

*Certain outdoor and industrial business : Industries of agriculture, forestry, livestock raising, fisheries, mining, construction, manufacturing (including processing of products), electric power, gas supply, water supply, heating supply, transport, automobile servicing, machine servicing, medical services, and cleaning

3. Appointment of an industrial physician
Similarly to the health officer, in the workplace regularly employing 50 workers or more, the employer must appoint an industrial physician regardless of type of business (Article 13, Industrial Safety and Health Act). The employer must also submit the report of appointment to the Chief of the competent Labor Standards Inspection Office. The industrial physician must meet a certain requirement such as passing the examination of an industrial health consultant.

4. Establishment of a health committee
The employer must establish a health committee in each workplace regularly employing 50 workers or more, for the purpose of investigating and deliberating the matters related to health, and stating the opinions to the employer (Article 18, Industrial Safety and Health Act).
The health committee must hold a meeting at least once a month and keep the minutes for three years. The health committee consists of members including a chairman, a health officer, an industrial physician, an employee of the said workplace with an experience related to health.

5. Submission of a report of the result of a medical examination
In the workplace regularly employing 50 workers or more, the employer must conduct a medical examination set forth in the Industrial Safety and Health Act and submit a report of the result of the medical examination without delay (Article 52, Ordinance on Industrial Safety and Health). The employer must keep the medical examination personal cards for five years.

6. Conduct of stress check
A stress checking system based on the Industrial Safety and Health Act was enforced on 1 December 2015. In the workplace regularly employing 50 workers or more, the employer must conduct an annual stress check and report it to the competent Labor Standards Inspection Office.

Regularly employing 50 workers or more counts the number of workers who are regularly employed and keep working regardless of the number of contracting dates and hours, and includes part-time workers who are under regular employment contracts even if they work once a week. However, the employees targeted for the stress check are the same as the employees targeted for the periodic ordinal medical examination, which means part-time workers working less than 3/4 of full-time workers a week or employees taking leave from work are not necessarily targeted for the stress check.

About the stress checking system, the Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare offers a dedicated website called ‘Kokorono-mimi’. (http://kokoro.mhlw.go.jp/)

7. Obligation of hiring persons with disabilities
The Japanese government requires the employer to hire more than a certain percentage of persons with disabilities of the total employees (a mandatory employment rate) (the Act on Employment Promotion of Persons with Disabilities). The employment rate of persons with disabilities is set 2.0% in private general companies, which means the employer regularly employing 50 workers or more is required to hire one person with disabilities.

If failing to meet the mandatory employment rate of persons with disabilities, the employer must pay the disabled employment levy. On the other hand, if exceeding the mandatory employment rate, the employer can receive the disabled employment adjustment money. However, the levy and adjustment money rules are not applied to the employer regularly employing 100 workers or less. The employer employing the person with disabilities makes the report of employment status as of 1 June of every year to Hello-work regardless of size of the workplace.

8. Provision of a resting room
In the workplace regularly employing 50 workers or more, or 30 female workers or more, it is stipulated that the employer must provide separate resting rooms or resting facilities for men and women, where they can lie in bed (Article 21, Ordinance on Health Standards in Office, Article 618, Ordinance on Industrial Safety and Health Ministry of Labor Ordinance).　This rule sets the place where the person in medical emergency can lie down until the ambulance comes or the person with poor health can take a rest. It is not necessarily required to secure separate private rooms or provide beds and blankets.

9. Regularly employed workers
’Regularly employing 50 workers or more’ means all workers working at workplaces at the time of regular seasons, unlike busy-seasons or off-seasons, including full-timers, contract workers, temporary workers and part-timers, regardless type of employment or length of scheduled working hours. (18 September 1972, Labor Standards Bureau Notification No. 602)

In addition, temporary workers are included into regular employed workers in both temporary staff agencies and workplaces. (6 June 1988, Labor Standards Bureau Notification No.652) The temporary staff agency has the obligation of conducting periodical medical examination and stress check to its temporary workers. But when considering the obligation of employment of persons with disabilities, the temporary workers at dispatched workplaces are not included into calculation.

10. Conclusion
In this News, we have provided information about the employer’s obligations related to labor law when employing 50 workers or more.

Please note that this News only introduces general outlines of the content and does not include professional advice. So please make sure not to make any decisions without taking professional advice individually. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us.