Imperial Family Bill May Clear Lower House as Early as Fri.

Tokyo, July 8 (Jiji Press)--Japan's House of Representatives is expected to approve a bill to revise the Imperial House Law as early as Friday after opposition parties on Wednesday agreed to return to parliamentary debates in the Lower House following concessions by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party to their demands.

During the day's talks with the opposition Centrist Reform Alliance, the LDP said that it would agree to hold intensive discussions at the Budget Committee of the lower chamber of the Diet, the country's parliament, with Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi in attendance.

The LDP also conveyed the ruling bloc's decision to give up a plan to enact a bill to cut the number of Lower House seats during the current Diet session.

This paved the way for the normalization of Diet proceedings in the all-important lower chamber. The opposition parties returned to debates at the House of Councillors, the upper chamber, on Tuesday.

In the Lower House, the ruling camp has suspended deliberations on the bill to reduce the number of the chamber's seats and another bill to establish a second Japanese capital, in order to prioritize the bill to revise the Imperial House Law aimed at securing a sufficient number of Imperial Family members.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]