Japanese train drivers whose errors delay services for as little as a minute are subjected to humiliating punishments by their employers that put efficiency before safety, a union leader claimed on Thursday, as the death toll from Monday’s derailment in Amagasaki rose to 106.
Osamu Yomono, Vice President of the Confederation of Railway Workers’ Unions, claimed that West Japan Railway (JR West), which runs the line where the accident occurred, ”prioritises its operations above all else, and uses fear to force employees to follow orders”.
Drivers for JR West were removed from their jobs to undergo days or even months of ”education”, during which they were berated by their superiors and shamed into admitting their ”incompetence”, he alleged. They were forced to perform mundane tasks such as writing endless reports.
Yomono said he believed that fear of a dressing down had led Ryujiro Takami, the 23-year-old driver of the Amagasaki train, to use excessive speed to make up 90 seconds lost after overrunning the previous stop by 40m.
Investigators have yet to determine the cause of the crash, which also injured more than 450 people. But they believe the train was travelling at more than 100kph as it rounded a bend — 30kph above the speed limit. The train flew off the rails and into a block of flats.
Takami had been reprimanded three times in his career with JR West, including 13 days of ”retraining” after he overran a station. His body was among several pulled from the wreckage yesterday.
Yomono said: ”I believe he desperately wanted to recover the lost time and escape punishment. Fear prevented him from making a rational judgement.”
Takuya Nakao, a driver for more than 13 years, was subjected to three months of re-education after overrunning a station. He was made to write six to eight reports a day, detailing the reasons for his error and the inconvenience it had caused.
”I was also made to wear my drivers’ uniform and stand on the platform to greet incoming trains and wish the driver a safe journey. I could tell by the way the drivers looked at me that they wondered what on earth I was doing. Later they realised I was being punished.”
Rail unions say the psychological pressure placed on punished drivers has led several to commit suicide.
One, Masaki Hattori, was reportedly placed in a tiny office and continuously yelled at by managers after he made an unscheduled 60-second stop to conduct routine safety checks in 2001.
At the end of the third day 44-year-old Hattori, a driver with 20 years on the job and a hitherto unblemished record, told friends he was near breaking point. He was found hanged at his home the following day.
Yomono said JR West, which is suspected of professional negligence in Monday’s crash, was alone among the Japan Railway group in linking pay rises to performance. ”Competition is particularly intense among workers at JR West”, he said. ”It is this pressure that leads to accidents.”
He conceded that placing priority on safety could affect punctuality. ”If safety comes first then, yes, there are going to be delays,” he said. ”But anyone who saw what happened on Monday will understand.”
The government said it was considering introducing a new certificate for train drivers. ”I wonder if we should be leaving driver qualification to train operators,” the Transport Minister, Kazuo Kitagawa, said. – Guardian Unlimited Â