TRANSPORTATION
License plate sales hit high
The Taipei Motor Vehicles Office yesterday said that it had received a record NT$160.68 million (US$5.02 million) in revenue last year from selling personalized license plate numbers — mostly with numbers that are considered auspicious. The figure is a 25 percent increase from 2013, the office said. At present, motorists are allowed to choose their favorite numbers for a fee of NT$2,000 to NT$6,000 per plate. When a popular number is involved, the plate is sold to the highest bidder, at prices that can exceed NT$1 million, the office said. Plates featuring numbers seen as lucky, such as 8888, 6666 and 9999, are the most sought-after in Taiwan. Other plates containing the number eight, such as 1688, 5888, 5889, 5678 and 6789, are also popular, as “eight” is a homonym for “prosperous” (fa, 發) in Chinese.
LABOR
Vendor inclusion mulled
The Ministry of Labor said it would soon discuss the possibility of including food and beverage vendor employees under the Labor Standards Act (勞動基準法), which regulates basic labor conditions, such as working hours and holidays. Working conditions for food and beverage vendor employees are currently negotiated between workers and their employers, meaning that workers are not protected in terms of the hours they are required to work, holidays, overtime pay and severance pay, the ministry said. Preliminary data show that about 10,000 people would benefit if employees of food and beverage vendors are included in the act, according to the ministry. Under the act, employees should not receive wages below the minimum wage and should not work more than eight hours per day and 84 hours every two weeks.
Staff writer, with CNA
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
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