Committee membership for legislators of smaller parties should not be determined by drawing lots, New Power Party (NPP) Legislator Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) said yesterday, after many of the party’s lawmakers did not make it onto their preferred committees.
Of the party’s five legislators, only Hsu Yung-ming (徐永明) and Hung Tzu-yung (洪慈庸) got their top choices, becoming members of the Economics Committee and the Social Welfare and Environmental Hygiene Committee respectively.
However, Freddy Lim (林昶佐) was allotted a seat on the Foreign and National Defense Committee instead of the Education and Culture Committee, which went to Amis Legislator Kawlo Iyun Pacidal, who was hoping for a place on the Internal Administration Committee governing Aboriginal affairs.
“If the larger parties have the generosity to let smaller parties pick from their areas of expertise, that would be a better way to handle it,” Huang, who doubles as the NPP’s executive chairman, said as he echoed comments by People First Party Legislator Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞).
Huang, who rose to prominence during the 2012 movement against monopolization of the media, was placed on the Finance Committee instead of the Transportation Committee, which has jurisdiction over the National Communications Commission, which regulates the media.
The Organic Law of Legislative Committees (立法院各委員會組織法) stipulates that parties that have too few legislators to qualify for seats on any of the legislature’s eight committees will have their committee membership determined by drawing lots.
Committee membership lasts for a year and lawmakers are allowed to trade positions if they fail to draw their preferred committee.
Parties with more than eight legislators are allotted committee membership proportionally and can directly submit committee membership lists.
In related news, Deputy Legislative Speaker Tsai Chi-chang (蔡其昌) yesterday met with Social Democratic Party (SDP) officials to discuss legislative reform as the party grapples with its future after failing to win any seats in last month’s legislative elections.
SDP spokesman Chen Shang-chih (陳尚志) said that the party would seek to attract new members, but that specific plans would have wait until a new governing committee is elected next month.
The party has about 100 members, he said.
The military has spotted two Chinese warships operating in waters near Penghu County in the Taiwan Strait and sent its own naval and air forces to monitor the vessels, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. Beijing sends warships and warplanes into the waters and skies around Taiwan on an almost daily basis, drawing condemnation from Taipei. While the ministry offers daily updates on the locations of Chinese military aircraft, it only rarely gives details of where Chinese warships are operating, generally only when it detects aircraft carriers, as happened last week. A Chinese destroyer and a frigate entered waters to the southwest
A magnitude 6.1 earthquake struck off the coast of Yilan County at 8:39pm tonight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with no immediate reports of damage or injuries. The epicenter was 38.7km east-northeast of Yilan County Hall at a focal depth of 98.3km, the CWA’s Seismological Center said. The quake’s maximum intensity, which gauges the actual physical effect of a seismic event, was a level 4 on Taiwan’s 7-tier intensity scale, the center said. That intensity level was recorded in Yilan County’s Nanao Township (南澳), Hsinchu County’s Guansi Township (關西), Nantou County’s Hehuanshan (合歡山) and Hualien County’s Yanliao (鹽寮). An intensity of 3 was
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The next minimum wage hike is expected to exceed NT$30,000, President William Lai (賴清德) said yesterday during an award ceremony honoring “model workers,” including migrant workers, at the Presidential Office ahead of Workers’ Day today. Lai said he wished to thank the awardees on behalf of the nation and extend his most sincere respect for their hard work, on which Taiwan’s prosperity has been built. Lai specifically thanked 10 migrant workers selected for the award, saying that although they left their home countries to further their own goals, their efforts have benefited Taiwan as well. The nation’s industrial sector and small businesses lay
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