Demanding job security and fair wages, striking Taichung Bus Company workers yesterday submitted petitions at the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) headquarters, the Presidential Office and the Council of Labor Affairs (CLA)
The protesters were expressing their anger over the Taichung City Government's handling of the dispute, which saw workers walk off the job on Oct. 16 and enter into negotiations with both the city government and the bus company.
"The Taichung City Government owns 10 percent of the Taichung Bus Company's shares. Mayor Jason Hu (胡自強) is a KMT member and used to be the government's representative on the board, but he quit the board as soon as the strike started," said protest organizer Liu Hsin-heng (劉欣恆).
Liu added that, as owner of 10 percent of company shares, the city government was the largest of its shareholders.
"Hu didn't have a new representative put on the board after he quit, as he was supposed to do, and we suspect this was because he wanted to steer clear of taking responsibility for the people of Taichung," said Liu.
The CLA, however, indicated that further action would be taken against management at the bus company.
"We are going to impose a fine on the Taichung Bus Company for dismissing its employees illegally," said Wu Chen-ling (吳征陵), deputy director of the Labor Relations Department at the CLA.
A statement released by the Taichung Bus Labor Union said that the strike was triggered by both a 40 to 70 percent wage reduction that commenced in June, as well as a delay in issuing September's wages. On Oct. 27, 180 workers were dismissed for failing to show up to work for three consecutive days.
"According to Article Seven of the law on disputed wages, if a dispute occurs between employees and an employer, the employer is not allowed to break contract or act against employees during negotiations," said union representative Huang Chiu-yun (黃秋雲).
The 200-strong group of protesters first handed their petition to an official at the KMT headquarters, before handing another in to the Presidential Office.
"Chang Chi-chung (張啟仲), a presidential advisor, is the chairman of the Taichung Bus Company, yet he has been taking absolutely no notice of our entitlements," said Liu.
The union alleged that Chang had regularly postponed paying wages. The bus company to date allegedly owes its employees a total of NT$70 million in retirement payments, NT$10.8 million in performance bonuses and NT$2.52 million in special bonuses.
The union said it believes that the company is undergoing a serious financial crisis and that the company's money might have been transferred to a subsidiary.
At their last stop on their Taipei protest, the workers asked the CLA to look into whether the bus company had illegally transferred money, preventing employees from recovering their entitlements.
The CLA agreed with the workers that the company had breached regulations by dismissing its employees during the negotiation period, said Yang Hsi-sheng (楊錫昇), a CLA spokesperson.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods