NT$50 billion jobs bill a major Cabinet headache

The Executive Yuan seems to be at its wit's end while dealing with opposition lawmakers to seek their support for the NT$50 billion job creation program, composed of 100 small public projects.

"Despite KMT Chairman Lien Chan's (連戰) recent refusal to meet with Premier Yu Shyi-kun to discuss the matter, we'll continue to negotiate with opposition lawmakers to seek their support for the bill," Cabinet spokesman Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday.

Lin also threw his weight behind Chang Jin-sheng (張景森), vice chairman of the Cabinet's Council for Economic Planning and Development, who had come under heavy fire from opposition lawmakers for his criticism of Lien.

Chang criticized Lien for ordering his party to hamper the passage of the bill.

"I believe he meant no harm while making the criticism," Lin said. "My personal interpretation is that the legislature should respect public opinion if there's a discrepancy between the opinions of lawmakers and the public."

In a bid to help push the passage of the project, President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) is scheduled to meet with non-DPP county commissioners and city mayors today to solicit their support.

Chen has already met with DPP county commissioners and city mayors to discuss the same issue.

The legislature approved a NT$20 billion public service job creation program in the last legislative session. Under the project, 80,000 jobless people aged between 35 and 65 may work for various government agencies for a monthly salary of NT$20,000.

The NT$50 billion program, dealing with public projects, has met with more resistance partly because the Cabinet wants to pay for it with bonds not subject to limits on the level of public debt, and partly because opposition lawmakers suspect it will be used to trade political favors.

In the wake of Chang's allegation, the pan-blue legislative caucuses have stopped cross-party negotiations with the Cabinet.

A campaign by DPP lawmakers to obtain endorsement of the NT$50 billion bill by 17 county commissioners and city mayors has also upset Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平).

Wang has painted the move as the Cabinet's "disrespect for the legislature's law-making authority."

If legislative parties fail to reach a consensus over the issue during cross-party negotiations, a showdown over the two job-creation budgets is inevitable.

Last December, the Executive Yuan approved the NT$20 billion project to create public-service jobs and the NT$50 billion public-construction program with the hope of boosting the economic growth rate to 3.52 percent and lowering the unemployment rate to below 4.5 percent this year.

Together the projects are expected to create 115,000 jobs. Each project will last for one year.

The Cabinet had wanted the projects paid for with extraordinary budgets, which would exempt them from legal limits on the amount of money the government can borrow. Opposition parties, on the other hand, want the two projects listed in supplementary budgets to keep public debt under control.

Although the legislature conditionally approved the NT$20 billion bill, it left the funding of the program to be raised with additional budgets.

The legislative budgetary committee also completed the review of the NT$50 billion project but the proposal failed to pass its second and third reading.

Lawmakers want the Cabinet to fund the project with additional budgets and borrow money if necessary to fund the project. This debt will be exempted from the legal limits on the amount of money the government can borrow.