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Taipei City partied to the tune of NT$22m

DPP Taipei City Councilor Chou Wei-yu holds a press conference yesterday to condemn the Taipei City Government for wasting taxpayers' money by holding birthday parties, Lunar New Year banquets and other celebrations for government employees. PHOTO: LIN CHENG-KUNG, TAIPEI TIMES

The Taipei City Government spent about NT$22.73 million last year on promoting fellowship or birthday parties and year-end parties for employees and the budgets were appropriated largely from the general business and administration expenses, the DPP's Taipei city councilors disclosed yesterday in a news conference.

"The city government often rejected construction projects that the city councilors suggested, citing fiscal difficulties, but then they squander nearly NT$19 million on celebrating employees' birthdays, NT$1.96 million on promoting fellowship parties during Lunar New Year and NT$1.7 million on year-end parties," DPP Councilor Chou Wei-yu (周威佑) said.

The statistics were released by the city's Department of Budget, Accounting and Statistics.

The general business and administration expenses were budgeted for items such as stationery, photocopying, postage, supplies and other incidentals such as employees' birthday parties.

Last year's expense was NT$150 million, about 0.001 percent of the total budgets of the city government, according to the statistics of the Department of Budget, Accounting and Statistics, Chou said.

"The general business and administration expenses should be used for helping the municipal projects move smoothly, rather than for all kinds of parties," Chou said. "Some departments, like the Information Department and Rules and Regulation Commissions, gave money in the form of gift certificates of NT$1,500 or NT$2,000."

DPP Councilor Wilson Tien (田欣) said this incident exposes the city government's spendthrift ways.

"The way they dispensed money was out of control. That was the hard-earned money of taxpayers," Tien said.

The secretariat expended about NT$800,000 on parties, Tien said, which was about 68.25 percent of its annual general business and administration expenses.

"I was curious about how the secretariat could pay for other incidentals for the year with the remaining money, which was about NT$300,000," he said.

"Other departments were similar," he added.

DPP City Councilor Hsu Chia-ching (徐佳青) said that although the law allows for the general business and administration expenses to be used on birthday parties or year-end parties, "it was relegated to the end of the the expense list."

"But the percentage that the city government spent was too high, some money was even appropriated from the budget of other projects," she said.

The Department of Public Housing, for example, Hsu said, has appropriated NT$161,700 from the public housing fund for dinners in the high-priced restaurants with "exhibition of business achievement" showing in the description column of the ledger.

Hsu emphasized that city councilors did not mean to forbid city employees from having parties to promote fellowship, which she thought was reasonable.

"But the city government treasury was so tight and has reached a NT$160 billion deficit," Hsu said.

"Mayor Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) often reminded us of the city's strained finances, but now I think we really need to review if it was necessary to spend such large sums of money on promoting fellowship," Hsu said.

The Department of Budget, Accounting and Statistics responded that the city government will cut 10 percent from the general business and administration budget next year.

The birthday party that the Department of Rapid Transit Systems meant to hold yesterday afternoon was cancelled because of the DPP councilors' concerns.
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