Bullying-related suicides and the failure to provide compulsory courses at high schools are taking center stage in debate at a special Diet committee charged with discussing a bill to revise the Fundamental Law of Education.

The two urgent issues were taken up by the major opposition Democratic Party of Japan at the House of Representatives Special Committee on the Fundamental Law of Education session that started deliberations on the revision bill Monday.

The administration of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe regards educational reform as one of the major issues to be tackled and wants to pass the revision bill during the current extraordinary Diet session.

The law stipulates fundamental principles and objectives of national education.

The DPJ, however, is calling for discussion of what it regards as more urgent issues.

Yoshihiko Noda of the DPJ told the committee that "we should discuss the practical problems we face today before deliberating the revision of the Fundamental Law of Education."

Referring to the issue of high schools failing to offer compulsory courses, Noda criticized the Education, Science and Technology Ministry for its negligence in grasping what was going on at high schools and for its slow response after the issue came to light.

In connection with this, Abe blamed school authorities for not following the government-set curriculum guidelines on compulsory subjects to be taught before graduation.

"In a bid to bring about good results in entrance examinations from a short-term perspective, the school authorities encouraged breaking the rules and this resulted in the current mess," Abe said. "They should reconsider their responsibility from a fundamental viewpoint because their responsibility is very grave."

Noda pointed out that the government faces a host of issues it must address before revising the education law.

Echoing Noda's view, DPJ Secretary General Yukio Hatoyama said, "The government-proposed revision bill does not present any possible solutions to the issues of bullying and failing to provide compulsory classes."

"We have no intention of delaying deliberations on the revision bill, but we think it's important to spend a lot of time deliberating on it in a way that's open to the public," he added.

Representing the Liberal Democratic Party, Tadamori Oshima, a former education minister, called for opposition cooperation in passing the revision bill, saying: "We have also been discussing a counterproposal forwarded by the DPJ before the public. It's the supreme responsibility of lawmakers to draw a definite conclusion on the matter."

Most of Monday's committee session was spent on deliberations on the required courses and school bullying issues. One reason for this is that about 50 hours have already been spent discussing the revision bill in the ordinary Diet session that ended in mid-June. A senior education ministry official said, "All points of contention have already been discussed."

Acknowledging that a considerable amount of discussion time has already been spent on the bill, Prime Minister Abe called on the Diet "to pass the bill as soon as possible to revamp national education after conducting further discussions."

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LDP accuses DPJ of buying time

In another development on the revision bill, DPJ Secretary General Hatoyama proposed establishing a research commission in each chamber of the Diet to discuss the bill.

During a meeting of committee executives held after the committee session, the ruling camp proposed holding a public hearing in three or four locations outside Tokyo while the DPJ called for holding hearings in all 47 prefectures.

A senior LDP member spurned the DPJ proposal, saying, "[The DPJ] is resorting to every means possible to buy time, although it denies doing so."

Putting aside such Diet tactics, the DPJ takes a stance of upholding the revision of the basic education law. Definitions of patriotism and religious education mentioned in the DPJ's counterproposal are considered to be more persuasive even by some LDP members than the LDP's definitions.

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