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Contractors may strike over cost reimbursement plan

The nation's public construction contractors, who encountered great operating difficulties after steel prices skyrocketed, yesterday urged the government to make up for the price hikes in construction materials or they will go on strike a week from today to put the government's infrastructure projects on hold.

The Taiwan Region Engineering Contractors Association (TRECA, 營造公會) held an internal meeting yesterday morning and reached a consensus, urging the government to scrap its reimbursement thresholds for rising material prices, an association representative said yesterday.

"The association hopes that the government can eliminate its current reimbursement standards of using the construction price index and only offering reimbursement in excess of 2.5 percent," Tseng Ching-tsung (曾景琮), vice president of the Taipei-based RSEA Engineering Corp (榮民工程), told reporters yesterday after the association's meeting.

The government uses the construction price index to decide if any reimbursement will be offered to contractors to compensate for potential losses after they are burdened with price increases reflected in the actual market price.

The association said it expects the government to either reimburse contractors based on the full market price or adopt centralized purchasing.

Tseng said the association had not yet reached a final decision, but will provide a concrete plan to the Public Construction Commission (PCC, 工程會) of the Executive Yuan tomorrow.
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