Noda Cabinet approval rating slides to 30%

The Yomiuri Shimbun

The approval rating of the Cabinet led by Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda fell to 30 percent from 37 percent in a January survey conducted immediately after a Cabinet reshuffle, a Yomiuri Shimbun survey has found.

In the nationwide telephone survey conducted Friday through Sunday, 57 percent of the respondents said they disapproved of Noda's Cabinet, up six percentage points from the previous survey conducted Jan. 13-14.

The approval rating of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan fell to 16 percent, down nine points from the previous survey and marking the lowest rating since the party won control of the government in September 2009.

The survey results suggest Noda is likely to face a difficult time ahead in his policy management.

Asked which party they support, 17 percent of the respondents said the Liberal Democratic Party, unchanged from the January survey.

However, 54 percent said they did not support any party, a significant increase from the 45 percent posted in the previous survey and the highest since the 2009 change of government.

The approval rating of the Cabinet among voters who do not support any party was just 22 percent, leading the fall in the overall approval rating of the Cabinet.

Asked about opinions concerning the government's administrative framework, 53 percent said they desired "a new framework by way of political realignment," indicating the public's strong sense of distrust for existing political parties.

Twenty-three percent of the respondents said they were in favor of a grand coalition of the DPJ and the LDP, while 9 percent favored an LDP-led administration. Only 5 percent said they favored a DPJ-led government.

Asked about which party they would vote for in the proportional representation segment of the next House of Representatives election, 21 percent said they would vote for the LDP, down from 23 percent in the previous survey. However, only 15 percent said they would vote for the DPJ, down from 18 percent.

Asked about the government and the ruling parties' plan to increase the consumption tax rate to 8 percent in April 2014 and to 10 percent in October 2015 to help finance the social security system, including the pension scheme, 39 percent approved of the plan, while 55 percent opposed it.

Concerning the agreement between Japan and the United States to transfer 4,700 U.S. marines in Okinawa Prefecture to Guam, scaling down from the originally planned 8,000, and separating the transfer from the issue of relocating the U.S. Marine Corps' Futenma Air Station in Ginowan in the prefecture, 39 percent said they were in favor of the agreement, while 38 percent were not.

Asked whether they expect swift recovery and reconstruction from the Great East Japan Earthquake with the inauguration of the Reconstruction Agency, 42 percent said they did, while 50 percent said they did not.

The survey covered 1,664 randomly selected households, with 1,036 eligible respondents.