Premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) does not need to report to the legislature about the Executive Yuan’s decision that the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant’s No. 1 reactor will be sealed up and the building of its No. 2 reactor suspended because that is “not a major policy change,” Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Lin Hung-chih (林鴻池) said yesterday.
Responding to the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) call for the premier to report on the Executive Yuan’s resolution to suspend the construction of the No. 2 reactor, Lin said there is no need for Jiang to do so since the Cabinet’s resolution is not related to the complete scrapping of the plant in New Taipei City’s Gongliao District (貢寮).
The Cabinet’s resolution is identical to the one reached at a meeting of KMT mayors on Sunday.
DPP caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) told the KMT to “stop playing with words” and said that KMT’s resolution, which recommends sealing the No. 1 reactor after a safety inspection is carried out and halting construction of the No. 2 reactor, is “tantamount to terminating the construction of the entire plant.”
“According to the Council of Grand Justices’ Interpretation No. 520, [the former DPP] government’s decision to terminate the plant’s construction [taken without the approval of the legislature] in 2000 was ruled unconstitutional,” Ker said.
“The termination of the project constitutes a major policy change as it pertains to budget allocation, which has to be reviewed by due legal process. So Jiang should report to the Legislative Yuan to deliver his report on this matter,” Ker added.
Lin said that the resolution is not a major policy change “since sealing up and suspending the construction of the reactors, which was clearly explained by Premier Jiang this morning, is not a termination of the whole facility’s construction, nor its dismantling.”
Lin added that the call to lower the national referendum threshold before holding a vote on the plant’s future stated in the special statue proposed by the DPP is “superfluous, since the Executive Yuan has already announced a halt to the construction of the No. 2 reactor and sealing up of the No. 1 reactor.”
The KMT’s stance is that a referendum is needed before the plant can go online, or fuel rods inserted into the reactors, he said, adding that since the question of whether the Gongliao facility should be activated is not applicable now, the DPP’s proposal is unnecessary.
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