Tokyo, Feb. 26 (Jiji Press)–Japanese Health, Labor and Welfare Minister Katsunobu Kato said Monday that 233 irregular data values have been additionally detected in a government labor survey at the center of a controversy over the government’s plan to expand the so-called discretionary work system.

 
The new revelation came during a House of Representatives Budget Committee meeting after Kato admitted last week that there were 117 data flaws in his ministry’s fiscal 2013 work time survey.

The newly found flaws include a sample worker’s daily overtime of zero despite positive figures in the worker’s weekly and monthly overtime totals.

Opposition parties suspect that the labor data were manipulated to support the government’s initiative for work style reform, urging it to suspend plans to submit bills for the reform during the ongoing session of parliament through June 20.

The planned bills include an expanded discretionary work system that allows fixed overtime terms to apply to a wider range of jobs.