The Tamesis
January 22, 2026
Tokyo – The Liberal Democratic Party’s official draft commitment for the House of Representatives election shows that it will speed up discussions on the issue of food consumption tax exemption within two years.
The Liberal Democrats are due to announce their formal commitment on Wednesday evening.
The draft pledge also includes promoting “responsible and proactive public finances,” as advocated by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, who is also president of the Liberal Democratic Party. To this end, the party said it would establish a new budget framework to expand state investment.
The official campaign is scheduled to begin on January 27, with voting and counting scheduled for February 8.
Active fiscal policy figures prominently in the draft pledge, which says the party will “promote bold strategic crisis management investments and growth investments to achieve a strong economy”. The report added that the new investment budget framework is expected to increase tax revenue, thereby delivering multi-year fiscal stimulus.
As for lowering the consumption tax, the pledge explained that discussions on funding sources, timetables and other implementation details will be “expedited” by a planned national committee, which will be composed of parliamentarians from both the ruling and opposition parties. Although the Liberal Democratic Party did not include a consumption tax cut in its Senate election pledge last July, its coalition agreement with the Innovation Party stated that it would consider cutting food consumption taxes.
Under the coalition agreement, the Liberal Democratic Party is also expected to commit to passing legislation to realize the “second capital” concept proposed by the JIP and reduce the number of seats in the House of Representatives by 10%.
On foreign and security issues, the Liberal Democratic Party is expected to commit to promoting a free and open Indo-Pacific region with the Japan-US alliance at its core. When it comes to ongoing tensions with China, the party aims to “build constructive and stable relations” while vowing to “respond calmly and resolutely to any provocation”.
These commitments also include scrapping five categories of exportable equipment specified in the Implementation Guidelines for the Three Principles of Defense Equipment and Technology Transfer. The move is aimed at easing restrictions and promoting exports of defense equipment.
The commitments also emphasize the need to ensure stable supplies of critical minerals such as rare earths in order to create a system that can withstand economic coercion from other countries. Further support for mine development. Regarding intelligence, including information collection and analysis, the draft commits to establishing a “foreign intelligence agency” responsible for gathering information from abroad. There was also talk of a policy long-supported by the Prime Minister to decriminalize the use of maiden names.
At the party executive meeting on Tuesday, Gao Shi said, “I will do my best to win the trust of the people through responsible and proactive public finance and achieve a major change in fiscal policy.”
