The Taiwan Railway Administra-tion (TRA) announced yesterday that it was confident that trains would be running as usual during the Mid-Autumn Festival on Sept. 11.
This is despite the Taiwan Railway Labor Union's plans to convene a members' conference to disrupt train services during the holiday.
The company began selling tickets for travel on Sept. 10 yesterday morning and will sell tickets for Sept. 11 today.
"For more than 100 years the TRA's employees have ensured the safe operation of the train system, running every day of the year, even during the Mid-Autumn Festival. We've never even thought about stopping normal train operation. We will maintain this honorable tradition," said Huang Te-chih (
However, the union said that because the Executive Yuan and the Ministry of Transportation and Communication had failed to meet any of its requests, it would persist in its plans to hold a members' conference on Sept. 11, leaving insufficient employees to operate trains during the holiday.
Vice Minister of Transportation and Communications Tsai Tui (蔡堆) said in order to facilitate holiday travel, highway tolls would be waived between 12am and 6am on Sept. 11. There will be no restrictions on the minimum number of passengers in each vehicle on this day.
Union chairman Chang Wen-cheng (張文正) said the union held a meeting on Tuesday and confirmed that only governmental response to their requests could persuade them to change plans. The union also decided to work with a group of lawyers, which will communicate its requests to government officials.
According to Chang, the union wants the Executive Yuan to publicly announce that it will stop the privatization of the TRA; propose a solution and execution schedule for the TRA's debt problem; subsidize the TRA by covering the deficit of local train stations and take care of the debts incurred by senior and disabled citizens' discount tickets and maintenance expenses; and make the employment restructuring of the TRA a priority, finalizing plans by the end of the year.
The union also demands that the Executive Yuan respond to its demands concerning bonuses for employees, flexibility of shifts and adjustments to the amount subsidized for work-related travel.
The union's grievances stem from the government's establishment of the Taiwan High Speed Railway Corp, a private enterprise commissioned to build a high-speed railway that would cut travel time between Taipei and Kaohsiung to just 90 minutes.
Chang said an estimated 11,000 employees were planning on taking a leave of absence on Sept. 11 to protest government policies.
Huang said that after today's sales there were still tickets left for travel on Sept. 10. He said this was not unusual.
Premier Yu Shyi-kun said yesterday that, for the sake of travelers, he hoped the ministry and the union could continue discussions. He asked the ministry to "expect the worst in order to make the best preparations."
Tsai promised that the ministry would be posting travel information online beginning Aug. 30.
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