The Legislative Yuan will become more transparent as it allows the public to access its video-on-demand (VOD) system for the first time and watch open-door legislative meetings from outside the legislature starting today.
An official at the legislature’s Information Technology Department told the Taipei Times that people would be able to watch live broadcasts as the eight standing committees hold meetings, as well as plenary sessions, at ivod.ly.gov.tw without having to register personal information.
PROCEDURE COMMITTEE
However, meetings of the pan-blue-dominated Procedure Committee would not be available as the legislature does not currently record those meetings, the official said.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that anyone interested in watching the videos should use Internet Explorer because of compatibility issues.
Only around 800 people will be able to use the Web site simultaneously because its bandwidth remains limited, he said.
The launch of the Web site can be seen as a major breakthrough in terms of legislative transparency.
For years, activists had urged the legislature to grant the public access to its VOD system, previously accessible only within the legislature, so the public could scrutinize lawmakers’ conduct.
However, some legislators had expressed concern that the footage could be manipulated by opponents to sabotage their image and political careers.
The matter remained unresolved until a task force composed of seven legislators across party lines on Jan. 30 reached a consensus to open the VOD system to the public.
C-SPAN
The task force took trips to the US in a bid to learn from the broadcast experiences of the C-SPAN channel.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Daniel Hwang (黃義交), a member of the task force, said they would negotiate with the National Communications Commission next in a bid to establish a channel similar to C-SPAN.
The legislative watchdog Citizen Congress Watch (CCW) lauded the changes.
“This is an historic step that the legislature has taken, it’s a breakthrough in Taiwan’s legislative history,” CCW executive director Ho Tsung-hsun (何宗勳) said yesterday.
“We’re glad that the legislature is doing so and would like to express our appreciation to all the lawmakers and all the civic groups that made this come true,” Ho said.
Ho said that the group would continue to push for more transparency in the Legislative Yuan.
“Meetings of the Procedure Committee are not included in the VOD broadcast at this time. Pushing for meetings at the committee on the public VOD system will be our next goal,” he said.
The group will hold an award ceremony today at the legislature to honor lawmakers who helped push for public access to the VOD system.
ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY LOA IOK-SIN
The inspection equipment and data transmission system for new robotic dogs that Taipei is planning to use for sidewalk patrols were developed by a Taiwanese company, the city’s New Construction Office said today, dismissing concerns that the China-made robots could pose a security risk. The city is bringing in smart robotic dogs to help with sidewalk inspections, Taipei Deputy Mayor Lee Ssu-chuan (李四川) said on Facebook. Equipped with a panoramic surveillance system, the robots would be able to automatically flag problems and easily navigate narrow sidewalks, making inspections faster and more accurate, Lee said. By collecting more accurate data, they would help Taipei
STATS: Taiwan’s average life expectancy of 80.77 years was lower than that of Japan, Singapore and South Korea, but higher than in China, Malaysia and Indonesia Taiwan’s average life expectancy last year increased to 80.77 years, but was still not back to its pre-COVID-19 pandemic peak of 81.32 years in 2020, the Ministry of the Interior said yesterday. The average life expectancy last year increased the 0.54 years from 2023, the ministry said in a statement. For men and women, the average life expectancy last year was 77.42 years and 84.30 years respectively, up 0.48 years and 0.56 years from the previous year. Taiwan’s average life expectancy peaked at 81.32 years in 2020, as the nation was relatively unaffected by the pandemic that year. The metric
TAKING STOCK: The USMC is rebuilding a once-abandoned airfield in Palau to support large-scale ground operations as China’s missile range grows, Naval News reported The US Marine Corps (USMC) is considering new sites for stockpiling equipment in the West Pacific to harden military supply chains and enhance mobility across the Indo-Pacific region, US-based Naval News reported on Saturday. The proposed sites in Palau — one of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies — and Australia would enable a “rapid standup of stored equipment within a year” of the program’s approval, the report said, citing documents published by the USMC last month. In Palau, the service is rebuilding a formerly abandoned World War II-era airfield and establishing ancillary structures to support large-scale ground operations “as China’s missile range and magazine
A 72-year-old man in Kaohsiung was sentenced to 40 days in jail after he was found having sex with a 67-year-old woman under a slide in a public park on Sunday afternoon. At 3pm on Sunday, a mother surnamed Liang (梁) was with her child at a neighborhood park when they found the man, surnamed Tsai (蔡), and woman, surnamed Huang (黃), underneath the slide. Liang took her child away from the scene, took photographs of the two and called the police, who arrived and arrested the couple. During questioning, Tsai told police that he had met Huang that day and offered to