President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday expressed his hope that foreign laborers would receive similar compensation as their Taiwanese counterparts following the deaths of six foreign laborers and one Taiwanese worker in a freeway construction accident.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) spokesman Su Jun-pin (蘇俊賓) said Ma, who doubles as KMT chairman, expressed grave concerns over the matter during the weekly closed-door Zhongshan meeting at the party’s headquarters yesterday morning.
Su quoted Ma as saying that the accident concerned public safety and protection of foreign workers’ rights.
The fatal accident occurred on Thursday last week when a section of scaffolding collapsed near Freeway No. 6’s Beishan Interchange (北山交流道) in Nantou County.
The Nantou Specialized Operation Brigade said its initial investigation suggested that the six foreign laborers were working at the construction site illegally — because the construction contract expressly prohibits such hiring — and died on their first day of work there.
Su said Ma took the example of a tunnel construction accident in March 2004 when he was Taipei mayor to illustrate his sympathy for foreign workers.
At that time, Su said the compensation for local workers was NT$300,000, but that for foreign laborers was only NT$5,000.
“How could there be such a large difference? Foreign workers also risked their lives for the city’s public construction,” Ma was quoted as saying.
The city then raised the amount to make them equal, he said, winning the appreciation of the victims’ families.
The move was a show of respect for life and showed the internationalization of the capital, Su said.
“We should compare other’s feelings with ours and we must be extra careful with the compensation for foreign workers,” Ma was quoted as saying.
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