Solidarity Contracts (Contratti di solidarietà): in the same cases granting CIG benefits, companies can sign contracts with reduced work time, to avoid dismissing redundancy workers.

And we must avoid dismissing a particular policy wholesale simply because the pretence of it has sometimes been used to justify iniquity.

Along with the Redundancy Funds, since 1984 companies can apply also for Solidarity Contracts: after a negotiation with the local trade unions, the company can establish contracts with reduced work time, in order to avoid dismissing redundancy workers.

Japan's large companies traditionally go to elaborate lengths to avoid dismissing workers outright, even in hard times.

"The foolishness of a nuclear-free world is in no way mitigated by the conditions that Western statesmen routinely attach to its achievement in order to avoid dismissing the idea as the empty propaganda that it is," Mr. Perle said.

In his 1973 book on the subject, Napier ultimately judged the evidence to be inconclusive: there was not enough hard proof to confirm to Napier that Bigfoot was a real creature, but Napier judged the indirect evidence - especially footprints - as compelling and intriguing enough to avoid dismissing it entirely.

A big question is whether the need for new cost cutting to cope with the strong yen will mean the end of the lifetime employment system, in which major companies go out of their way to avoid dismissing full-time male employees.