New Year's Press Conference by Prime Minister ISHIBA Shigeru
January 6, 2025
[Provisional translation]
Opening Statement by Prime Minister Ishiba
Happy new year, everyone.
I have just paid a visit to Ise Jingu Shrine, where I prayed for 2025 to be a fruitful year of peace and security for all the Japanese people.
This year marks 80 years since the end of the war. In accordance with that, I feel a strong desire to make 2025 a year in which, together with the Japanese people, we think once again about peace and about what Japan should be like as a peace-loving nation. I want to make this, the 80th year since the war ended, a year in which we also think once again about democracy.
We were handed a stern judgment as the outcome of last year's general election, resulting in a minority ruling party for the first time in roughly three decades. As the leading political party, we in the Liberal Democratic Party, from the position of overseeing national policy together with Komeito, must be a ruling party of responsibility, accepting responsibility for the citizens of the present and the citizens of the next generation. That should go without saying.
At the same time, in order to build consensus that transcends political parties and factions, this is the time for members of opposition parties also to share in responsibility to a greater degree than before. I believe we must work with a view to earning the understanding and sympathy of the public, with each member of the Diet taking part in debates from a position of responsibility.
As a main principle of our national policy, we will engage in discussions in a straightforward manner at all times and lay out the overall direction of national administration with only the welfare of the Japanese people as a whole in mind. This is what then-Prime Minister ISHIBASHI Tanzan said in his policy speech to the Diet in February 1957. Just as he stated, each individual politician must do his or her utmost in facing various issues sincerely for the sake of the Japanese people, with the awareness that the debates between the ruling and opposition parties will shape the future of Japan.
I want to take a new step forward together with the Japanese people in the true image of democracy, namely to derive better proposals through sincere policy consultations that reflect the variety of voices among the citizenry. In light of that, our debates on how to sustain democracy are important.
Last year, concerning political funds, after the general election I announced the abolition of policy activity expenses, the disclosure of the use of the allowance covering research, public relations, and accommodation expenses and the return of any remaining funds, and the establishment of a third-party organization [to conduct audits]. Regarding these reforms, wide-ranging discussions transcending political parties and factions resulted in the realization of reforms to the legal system before 2024 came to an end. We will also hold earnest discussions on a draft bill aimed at prohibiting corporate and organizational donations and work to finalize the bill before the end of the fiscal year.
The essential nature of this issue lies in who should bear the costs of democracy. What balance should we strike among subsidies from the public purse, funds from corporations and organizations, funds from individuals, and spending by politicians themselves? What should we regard as the ideal rules for political parties and political organizations, consistent with the fact that they receive subsidies from the national government and as a general rule receive special tax-exempt treatment? And, how will we ensure those rules are followed? I intend to deepen our discussions in a way that goes beyond the lines delineating the ruling and opposition parties.
Regarding election campaigns, some things happened in various elections last year that were beyond what we had anticipated until then. We also need discussions grounded in what happened in those cases. Both in years past and today, it remains the case that democracy really takes shape when a multitude of opinions battle it out on the playing field of healthy discourse.
Whether we consider political funds or election campaigns, the important thing is for the voters to be properly provided with the information they need to make a decision. Then, grounded in those materials for correctly informing people's opinions, what is important is the will of more people being reflected appropriately in politics for a broader swath of generations. What should the electoral system be like in order to bring that to fruition? I believe that we need to examine this point as well, once again in a manner that rises above party and factional lines, taking into account the roughly three decades of history we have had under the current electoral system.
Here in the 80th year since the end of the war, if we look back on history, Japan, under the centralized state system of the Meiji Revolution aimed for "a strong Japan" under the slogan, "Rich nation, strong army." After World War II, during reconstruction from the wartime defeat and also during the high economic growth period, our nation aimed at "a prosperous Japan."
For "a strong Japan," it was primarily the national government that led the way. For "a prosperous Japan," it was mainly private companies that took the lead. And from now on, we should aim at "an enjoyable Japan," which each individual brings into realization. That is what the late Prof. SAKAIYA Taichi pointed out in his final book. I agree with this to a great degree, and I want to work together with the Japanese people to build a "third Japan," by which I mean that "enjoyable Japan" that is realized by each individual.
So, what exactly is this "enjoyable Japan"? It is a vibrant nation where, atop the great achievements of strength and prosperity attained by our ancestors, all people feel and believe in safety and security under world peace, and individual Japanese citizens with diverse values, buoyed by the tangible feeling that tomorrow will be brighter than today, take on challenges to achieve their dreams and work towards self-realization while also treasuring each other.
Setting what I call "the Reiwa Era remodeling of the Japanese archipelago" as the first pillar, I will press forward vigorously with "Regional Revitalization 2.0." We will review the concentration [of people, workplaces, government functions, etc. in Tokyo], which, it has been pointed out, was promoted as national policy during the eras when the Government pursued "a strong Japan" and "a prosperous Japan," and make diversity the source of our future strength.
There have been many efforts promoted to date [to rectify the disparity between urban and rural areas], including then-Prime Minister TANAKA Kakuei's "plan for remodeling the Japanese archipelago," then-Prime Minister OHIRA Masayoshi's "Garden City Nation" idea, and then-Prime Minister TAKESHITA Noboru's "revitalization of hometowns." Taking these initiatives as a base, I will promote this Reiwa Era remodeling of the Japanese archipelago with a strong sense of urgency, that there will be no future for Japan unless we succeed in this extraordinarily important phase during which we create a "third Japan."
Towards that end, first of all, I dare say that I believe the Government should be one step out in front regarding this initiative. We will press forward aggressively to transfer government agencies, including the Disaster Management Agency we aim to newly establish, to regional areas to their optimal location domestically. We will verify the results of the initiatives that have been taken to date and once again solicit proposals from local areas, drawing conclusions one and then another.
Needless to say, we will not be able to achieve our goals through the actions of Government alone. We will place importance on partnering with new actions taken by the private sector and strengthen those relations. From the perspective of making local areas into locations that will be chosen by young people and women, we will proactively prepare the environments that will help us realize the creation of startups in local areas, the transfer to local areas of the headquarters functions of companies located in urban areas, and multipolar decentralization, among other changes.
Public and private sector entities will collaborate in fostering environments where young people, women, and others can work comfortably. The improvements they will bring will include eliminating gender-based wage disparities and unconscious assumptions -- I hear the recent term for this is "unconscious biases." Public and private sector actors will also work together to advance local communities.
We will leverage the power of the private sector to comprehensively advance the use of smart technology in the agriculture, forestry, and fishery industries, the tourism industry, and so on, all of which have enormous potential even at the global level, and make them into profitable industries. From the perspective of food security as well, we will further promote agriculture, forestry, and fishery exports.
The public and private sectors will also come together to utilize artificial intelligence (AI), digital technologies, and the like to maintain and reinforce the functions of infrastructure needed for daily life, such as transportation systems, medical facilities, nursing care facilities, and other infrastructure sustaining people's daily lives in local areas.
Focusing on what we could call the population concerned, we will support activities based in the two areas of one urban and one rural location. In order to give rise to new flows of people, under the principle of first taking the actions we call on others to take, we will newly establish a system for supporting young national civil servants who are active in two locations.
With the population declining, it will be imperative for us to draw out to the greatest possible extent the potential held by each individual by fostering human resources and reforming education, to be taken through public-private partnership. In making that a reality, the important points will be the quality and the content of the education. We must clearly set out how we wish to raise our children.
This will require not only schools but also local governments and people in local communities to act as a united front in thinking about and participating in the cultivation of human resources who are not only armed with knowledge and capabilities but also value history, culture, the community, and the people around them and have the capacity to take action.
Clean energy generated from decarbonated energy sources such as renewable energies and nuclear power, as well as hydrogen and other next-generation fuels, reduce the carbon dioxide emitted during the process of manufacturing cars, semiconductors, and other products and are indispensable in strengthening the competitiveness of our exports. We will expand our supply bases for these items and move forward in newly concentrating industries in the surrounding areas while efficiently developing the supply network for electricity, hydrogen, and more. This will serve as a major pillar of Regional Revitalization 2.0. These efforts will lead Japan to a higher energy self-sufficiency rate, which currently hovers at 15 percent.
AI has made remarkable progress in recent years and is a vitally important technology affecting Japan's competitiveness and the prosperity of society in the modern world. The use of AI in local regions or in service industry or manufacturing industry settings facing labor shortages is highly anticipated, with data and energy being the essential elements supporting the development of AI. From the standpoint of economic security as well, building upon our ability to develop and manufacture important advanced semiconductors, we must efficiently and while ensuring cybersecurity prepare an information and communications network that connects AI sites, data centers, the manufacturing of diverse products and development of services, and users.
Such kinds of infrastructure for a new age will form the support for green transformation (GX) and digital transformation (DX). We will encourage the repositioning of industrial bases and central hubs for daily life activities, with the infrastructure for the new age serving as the axis around which this repositioning takes place.
In years past, a plan for remodeling the Japanese archipelago put forth by then-Prime Minister Tanaka Kakuei gave rise to a flow of people and was aimed at realizing balanced development across Japan. It took the development of roads, railways, the communications network, and other "hard" types of infrastructure as a starting point.
Taking this as the foundation, Regional Revitalization 2.0 creates regional centers through joint public and private efforts and gives rise to a flow of people to local areas through the attraction of not only regional "hard" infrastructure but also "soft" regional aspects. Regional Revitalization 2.0 also utilizes initiatives to develop human resources and infrastructure, with these initiatives being appropriate for how new local regions and urban areas should be.
I myself and indeed the entire Cabinet will to the greatest possible extent travel to local areas all around Japan, visiting places where such efforts are underway, and work to deepen the dialogues held among each area's industry, government, academia, financial institutions, labor organizations, and the media.
We will take information from various local areas about concrete steps being taken towards Regional Revitalization 2.0 and disseminate it nationwide, circulating information about one area's efforts and then another's, thereby bringing about bold reform as what we can call "the Reiwa Era remodeling of the Japanese archipelago."
Alongside the vitality of the local areas, it will be critical to restore the vitality of the economy as a whole. By transitioning from a cost-cutting economy to an economy based on the creation of high amounts of added value, we will bring about a growth-driven economy led by wage increases and investment.
At last year's exchange of views among the government, management, and labor, building on the momentum we had last year when wage increases attained a level not seen for some 30 years, I requested cooperation in bringing about a considerable wage increase during this year's annual spring wage bargaining negotiations between management and labor. The national government will to the utmost of its ability take measures to bring about the target set very high of raising the national weighted average minimum wage to 1,500 yen during the 2020s.
Under a deflationary economy, while the dividends and foreign investments of Japanese companies have increased, their domestic investments and wages have been sluggish. Finally, as bright signs begin to appear, we will advance our preparations of a new environment where companies move further forward in investing in growth towards the future.
In order to realize an economic virtuous cycle in which investments link in to wage growth, which ties in to consumption, it will be absolutely essential to ensure people have a sense of protection under the social security system. It is vital for us to respond to calls for an increase in take-home pay and maintain and reinforce the sustainability of the system.
In Japan, where the rapid decrease in our population from our dwindling birthrate and aging population is gaining momentum, as we plan the future of the social security system, we will build a social security system oriented to all generations, in which we provide support for each other depending not on age but on people's ability to shoulder the burden. In addition, we will realize a community-cohesive society in which everyone, including the elderly, persons with disabilities, and households raising children, can participate, connect with each other, and support each other in their local area in a lively manner, and rebuild a society that, in the midst of a labor shortage, values working people. These approaches will be key. They will be the efforts that will also lead to regional revitalization.
We must responsibly hand down to the next generation our social security system providing medical and nursing care, pensions, and other support. In particular, the pension system, which operates over a long period of time, is a matter on which we are called to find agreement, irrespective of our affiliation with the ruling or opposition parties. Accordingly, first of all I sincerely hope that each political party will engage in constructive debate beginning with the pension system reform bill.
One year has passed since the 2024 Noto Peninsula Earthquake, and three months since the torrential rains that struck in the midst of reconstruction. On New Year's Day, I attended the Memorial Ceremony for the victims of the quake, where I pledged to work hard to bring about at the earliest possible time the rebuilding of people's daily lives as well as their occupations and livelihoods and the creative reconstruction of the disaster-stricken area.
While there is no way to prevent natural disasters from occurring, we must work to minimize damage by making preparations during ordinary times, and we must promptly prepare environments based on the Sphere Standards (minimum standards related to the Humanitarian Charter and humanitarian responses) so that people affected by disasters are able to live with dignity while evacuated. This is incumbent upon the nation.
We will accelerate our preparatory efforts working to establish the Disaster Management Agency, to be led by a dedicated minister and staffed with a sufficient number of experts, within fiscal 2026. We must prepare for not only increasingly intense torrential rain damage but also such possibilities as an earthquake directly below the capital or an earthquake in the Nankai Trough. We will build Japan up as a disaster-resilient nation that places its highest priority on human life and human rights, and we will make Japan, one of the most disaster-prone countries in the world, the most disaster-resilient nation on earth. We will communicate our knowledge and technologies to deal with disasters to other nations and contribute to disaster management around the globe while also making this a new pillar of industry.
As we begin the 80th year since the end of the war, I want to make this year one in which we think once again about what kind of role Japan should play in order to maintain world peace and security, and then put that into practice. Japan now faces the most severe and complex security environment ever in the post-war period. In that context, the basis for thoroughly protecting Japan's peace and security, as well as the daily lives of the Japanese people, is ensuring sufficient deterrence as we build up dialogue with relevant nations over time.
The most critical thing of all is for our defense capabilities to include sufficient capabilities to deter others from launching a war against us. Our defense capabilities must therefore be sufficient deterrence capabilities. It is not the case that our Self-Defense Forces (SDF) operate on equipment alone. It is an extremely serious matter that we lack a sufficient number of SDF officers to operate the equipment. At the end of last year, we compiled the overall direction of policies and measures that the Government, acting as one, should take to resolve this issue, and we will be swift in implementing it.
In discussing deterrence, the focus is often on punitive and retaliatory deterrence, but for Japan, which relies primarily on the extended deterrence of the United States, it is imperative for us to reinforce our deterrence by denial. Japan possessing the capabilities to neutralize attempts by the other side deters such attempts. That is deterrence by denial. This is the reason why we place importance on protecting the Japanese people, and we will press forward steadily and urgently in securing shelters and making other efforts.
It is also necessary to make a level-headed assessment of the balance of power within our region of the globe. In the case that we determine there is a risk that imbalances of power will lead to regional instability, or we determine that such a situation is already taking shape, what should Japan do? The government must take up this kind of question head-on. Of course, even when deterrence is effective, we must also engage in dialogue. Many wars in the past were caused by misunderstandings and miscalculations on both sides. The significance of our day-to-day diplomatic activities is found precisely in this point.
We will raise the level of Japan's own capabilities. We will raise the Japan-U.S. alliance to even greater heights. And we will both expand and deepen the network we enjoy with countries in the region that are on the same page as Japan. Taking the utmost care, we will keep a constant watchful eye on whether or not the balance of power has taken a form unfavorable for us. We will build up such efforts as time goes on while simultaneously being certain to maintain thoroughgoing dialogues with countries concerned and deepening our relations of trust. We will tirelessly examine such efforts again this year and put them into practice.
This year is the year of the snake. It is said that the year of the snake is a year for rebirth and evolution, because snakes repeatedly shed their skin as they grow larger. Building atop the achievements attained by our ancestors, and wishing for Japan to become vibrant, my administration will work hard this year to make a "third Japan," which is to say an "enjoyable Japan" taking peace, safety, and security as its major premises. I hope to make this a year for building such a Japan, working together with the Japanese people.
I ask for your ongoing kind consideration again in the year to come.