"大阪医科大の元アルバイトに賞与認めず、最高裁で逆転敗訴　原告「非正規2100万人のこと見ていない」", 13 Oct 2020

[Excerpt translation from Japanese to English provided by the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre.]

On 13 Oct [2020], the Supreme Court…ruled against a former irregular worker and secretary at the Osaka Medical College who was seeking seasonal bonuses, reversing the Osaka High Court’s decision …All five magistrates were unanimous in their ruling.

At the center of the trial was Article 20 of the Labour Contract Act, which prohibits unreasonable disparities based on fixed-term employment…

The plaintiff was a secretary who worked full time at the Osaka Medical College. She argued for “equal pay for equal work,” pointing out that she was a secretary for more faculty members than secretaries who were hired as regular employees in another lab…

The Osaka High Court…focused on the fact that the college had given bonuses to contract staff with limited job responsibilities and determined that these employees' affiliation with and employment at the institution were factors in distributing bonuses. It thus ruled that in consideration of the employee’s merits and contributions, the college must pay the plaintiff 60% of the standard bonus distributed to regular employees.

In contrast, the Supreme Court determined that the purpose of the college’s bonuses was to secure and retain regular workers. It also determined that regular employees could face job transfers and were assigned responsibilities that did not apply to irregular employees. Based on this comparison, the court found that it “could not ignore a certain degree of difference between regular and irregular employees.”

The court also considered the fact that the college was in the process of changing secretarial positions from irregular to regular employment and that there was a promotion system for whereby irregular employees could become contract staff or regular employment by passing an exam. The court thus ruled that “it could not say with certainty whether it was unreasonable for the college to deny seasonal bonuses” to the plaintiff.

The court also reversed the lower court’s decision that the college must pay wages for the plaintiff while she was absent due to a personal injury because such compensation is meant to ensure employee retention for regular workers.

Ultimately, the Supreme Court recognized that the college owned the plaintiff merely 50,110 yen for an unreasonable disparity resulting from the “5 days of summer vacation” rule [in which employers are required at a minimum to provide 5 days of paid leave for employees that receive more than 10 days of paid annual leave]…

Article 20 of the Labour Contract Act has been integrated into Article 8 and 9 of the Part-Time/Fixed-Term Employment Act [which went into effect in April 2020]. Furthermore, the Ministry of Labour, Health and Welfare states in its guidelines on “equal pay for equal work” that cases where an employer provides seasonal bonuses to all regular employees is “problematic” when such payments are also not given to short-term/fixed-term employees…