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City in Fukushima hires lawyer to claim damages from TEPCO

10 Comments

The city of Futaba in Fukushima Prefecture says it has hired a lawyer to claim damages on behalf of the city’s residents, who were evacuated en masse after the March 11 tsunami destabilized the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Futaba lies within the 20-kilomerter no-go zone around the stricken plant.

Fuji TV reported that residents had complained the filing process to claim damages from Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) was too complex. The city created its own filing procedures for residents that its claims are simpler, and formally asked TEPCO – which runs the plant – to simplify theirs as well.

This marks the first time that a city administration has obtained a lawyer in Japan.

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10 Comments
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Only this city in Fukushima ken?? Me thinks this will be the TIP OF THE ICEBERG when it comes to lawsuits against these stupid, evil bastards at Tepco!

-3 ( +0 / -3 )

Go Fukushima!! Class action baby! Stick it to them!!

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As soon as this goes ahead and other cities join in or launch their own suits, tepco will have to be nationalised. Which means the tax payers will be left to foot this bill as we have been doing all along. Do not get me wrong, I for one cannot wait to see the back of tepco, but they do not have endless pockets and that will mean even higher bills for the rest of us as these costs will skyrocket.

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who's he? lawyer's name withheld(?)

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@nsg79

Tax payers are flipping the bill anyways. They are asking for billions of yen in loans so that they ca pay for damages which translates the tax payers and customers paying for it. And to add to that TEPCO will be raising the cost of electricity.

I would rather see it be nationalized and then highly regulated, rather than in the hands of TEPCO who will continue to cut corners to cut a profit without considering the risk of public safety. TEPCO deserves to die.

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@ mirai hayashi - I completely agree with you re the nationalisation and higher regulation. If you read my comment I clearly stated that:

Which means the tax payers will be left to foot this bill, as we have been doing all along

I was just making the statement (like you) that everyone will need to be prepared to pay higher bills and taxes to pay for these lawsuits.

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I agree, but if TEPCO becomes nationalized, it won't be profit driven anymore hence we probably won't see higher bills

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First time for a lawyer? It's finally come to this?

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What A joke this is!

All the billions of yen donated but not disbursed is one cause here

Also Fukushima residents are to be given tickets only redeemable in Fukushima for goods or services but NOT cash

An irradiated population under centralized bureaucratic control to the death.....

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Mirai HayashiDEC. 27, 2011 - 11:41AM JST I agree, but if TEPCO becomes nationalized, it won't be profit driven anymore hence we probably won't see higher bills

Just speaking in general terms here but 'nationalized' does not always equal 'better'. Quite often it can lead to stagnation, inefficient operation, outdated systems, etc., etc. Sure, rates might not go up right away, but even nationalized companies have costs (which sometimes are not so obvious) and these costs will need to be paid in some way. Besides TEPCO (like most public utilities) is already being operated as sort of a 'quasi-nationalized' company (due to the principle of 'economies of scale' as well as other market factors) and many of it's upper management appear to be either former government officials ('Amakudari') or closely connected to the government bureaucracy in some way.

Not sure if the best solution to this problem is that the Government take over TEPCO in perpetuity. If they are really gonna take control in order to oversee the clean up of this mess than it would be best if they also have a plan for getting out when that task is done.

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