Breakfast meeting with Yasutoshi Nishimura Shadow Minister of Finance Liberal Democratic Party (LDP)

Our guest speaker this month was Shadow Minister of Finance Yasutoshi Nishimura, a former Parliamentary Vice-Minister for Foreign Affairs and former Shadow Minister for Economy, Trade and Industry. Mr Nishimura, runner-up to Sadakazu Tanigaki in the LDP presidential election of 2009, spoke about the LDP's position on a range of key issues including how best to finance the third FY2011 supplementary budget, the content and priorities for the FY2012 budget, how to deal with yen strength and hollowing out, and the prospects for cooperation or confrontation with the DPJ government of Prime Minister Noda. With pressure on Japan to make its position clear before the APEC summit in Hawaii in mid-November, Mr Nishimura also talked about the LDP's view on participating in negotiations to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership.