City-employed car park attendants took to the streets outside Taipei City Hall yesterday, demanding that the municipal government give them two days off per week.
Roughly 150 employees from the city's union of car park attendants demonstrated yesterday, asking Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (
On Jan. 10, the Office of Car Parking Administration agreed in writing to give the attendants two days off per week.
But that agreement was provisional and required the review of the city's Bureau of Transportation, which oversees the administration's personnel policies.
According to union officials, the bureau was supposed to decide within three days whether it would accept the new working agreement, but didn't respond until Nov. 9.
A union official yesterday said Chen Wu-cheng (陳武正), the head of the transportation bureau, told them that only office workers under his department would receive two days off per week.
"He told us to our faces that ... the two days off per week only applies to the city government's office workers, not to us `manual' workers," said Hung Lien-tso (
Hung said that it was unfair that other city workers get two days off per week, but not car park attendants.
"We're the only group of Taipei City workers not to enjoy this benefit ... We find it thoroughly unreasonable," he said.
Hung said the group expects to receive equal treatment, even though "we don't have an office in Taipei City Hall."
He said that union representatives met with Chen on Dec. 4, but they did not come to an agreement.
Dissatisfied, the workers took their fight directly to the mayor, who "instructed Chen to take care of the matter," according to Ching Tai-sheng (
"But to date, we have seen no attempt by Chen to help us," Ching said.
Chen could not be reached for comment yesterday.
Cheng Tsun-chi (
Ching said negotiations are "most likely to take place within seven days."
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