No Vote in Upper House on Bill to Abolish Provisional Gasoline Tax; Bill Likely to Be Scrapped

The Yomiuri Shimbun

18:08 JST, June 21, 2025

A House of Councillors committee did not vote on Saturday on a bill to abolish the provisional gasoline tax rate, which was jointly submitted by the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan and other six opposition parties. The bill is expected to be scrapped.

Deliberations on the bill were held at the upper house Committee on Financial Affairs on Saturday, an unusual event for the day before the ordinary Diet session ends on Sunday.

The opposition parties proposed taking a vote on the bill after the question-and-answer session, but the ruling camp did not agree to it. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition partner Komeito have a majority of seats in the upper house.

Upper house Diet Affairs Committee chairpersons of the LDP and the CDPJ met on Saturday morning at the Diet building and discussed voting on the bill.

In the committee meeting, regarding the bill aimed at abolishing the ¥25.1 per liter tax from July 1, LDP upper house member Toshimitsu Funahashi criticized the scheduling, saying, “It is too unrealistic,” noting concern about confusion on the distribution front line.

In response, Kazuhiko Shigetoku, CDPJ’s Policy Research Committee chairperson, who submitted the bill, said, “It is necessary to take emergency measures against the current high prices.”

The bill was submitted on June 11 by seven opposition parties — the CDPJ, the Japan Innovation Party, the Democratic Party for the People, the Japanese Communist Party, Sanseito, the Conservative Party of Japan and the Social Democratic Party.

The bill was passed at the plenary session of the House of Representatives with a majority vote by the opposition parties on Friday. Deliberations on the bill began at the plenary session of the upper house on Friday.