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On June 9, 2021, the Prime Minister held the eighth meeting of the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy in 2021 at the Prime Minister’s Office.

At the meeting, the participants engaged in discussions toward the Basic Policy on Economic and Fiscal Management and Reform 2021.

Following the discussion, the Prime Minister said,
 
 “Today, we held discussions on the draft of the Basic Policy.
 
We intend to make intensive investments especially in four areas, namely, green and digital fields, local communities, and children, in order to bring solutions to long-standing problems and achieve a powerful growth, while first giving the highest priority to the response to the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19).
 
An early economic recovery requires a creation of a virtuous economic cycle of raising incomes through wage hikes and expanding consumption from now on. This year, we will raise the minimum wage, aiming to achieve the national weighted average of 1,000 yen at an earlier time, so as to correct the disparity that has widened due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
 
We will take countermeasures against the declining birthrate and provide childcare support, including making fertility treatments covered by public health insurance, expanding childcare services, and preventing child abuse. In order to implement relevant policies in a seamless manner regardless of the age of children, get rid of sectionalism across ministries and agencies, and thereby take on challenges in a comprehensive manner, we will swiftly embark on discussions toward the establishment of a new administrative organ.
 
We will also respond to new problems identified during the COVID-19 pandemic. We will quickly deliberate on legislative measures, including frameworks for securing hospital beds and healthcare personnel and for enabling earlier commercialization of therapeutic medication and vaccines in, as it were, contingencies caused by infectious diseases.
 
While advancing growth-oriented policies, we will meet the goal of realizing fiscal soundness, such as achieving primary balance surplus, and continue our existing efforts to improve government expenditures, based on the idea that the economy is the foundation of public finance.
 
We will formulate the Basic Policy in the middle of this month based on today’s draft. I ask each minister to advance discussions to ensure that the Basic Policy gives the big picture of our course of action.”