Japan’s parliament will get additional restrooms for women, officials announced Thursday, following a petition by 58 female lawmakers demanding more facilities to match their improved representation.
In Japan, gender roles are rigid and women are chronically underrepresented in politics, with only 68 female representatives elected out of 465 winnable seats in the last lower house elections in February.The government says it wants women to hold at least 30% of legislative seats. A spokeswoman for the House of Representatives said in a statement that “the toilet adjacent to the main room contains only two separate cubicles for women, but the number will increase to four” after the end of the current parliament session on July 17.Without wanting to give her name, she added that plans to add more kiosks on other floors are also under consideration.“I welcome this move to improve the huge shortage of women’s toilets for parliamentary staff and secretaries as well, even if only slightly,” Hideko Nishioka, the only woman on the committee involved in approving the expansion, told local media.The cross-party petition, which included 58 signatories, including Japan’s first female prime minister Sanae Takaishi, was submitted in December to the House of Representatives Committee on Rules and Administration.
“Before the plenary sessions start, many female lawmakers line up in front of the toilets,” Yasuko Komiyama, of the opposition Constitutional Democratic Party, said at the time.The Parliament Building was completed in 1936, almost a decade before women gained the right to vote in December 1945 following Japan’s defeat in World War II. The entire lower building contains 12 men’s restrooms, 67 stalls and nine women’s facilities for a total of 22 stalls, according to the Yomiuri Shimbun.Japan ranked 118th out of 148 countries last year in the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report. Women are also significantly underrepresented in the business sector and the media. In elections, female candidates say they often have to deal with sexual taunts, including being told they should stay home to take care of the children.(This is an AFP story)
