Netizens have ridiculed suggestions by former minister of the interior Lee Hong-yuan (李鴻源) that the government should mandate that people like convenience store managers, building security personnel and taxi drivers be trained and certified in disaster prevention.
The comments were made at Tuesday’s opening of the Association for Taiwanese Capital Area Councilor’s Disaster Prevention.
Netizens said that 7-Eleven workers were not paid enough to handle disaster prevention alongside clerking duties, dry cleaning, handling payments and billing, as well as making coffee.
Convenience store clerks are not superhuman, netizens said.
Despite the criticism, one 7-Eleven store manager said he met all the requirements Lee listed, though he disagreed with Lee’s idea, saying that “disaster prevention really is not in the job description of convenience store staff.”
Lin Hung-chang (林洪樟), who is the manager of a 7-Eleven store in Pingtung County’s Hengchun Township (恆春), has certificates in emergency medical aid, on-site fire rescue and other disaster prevention-related certificates.
Lin volunteers at the local fire department and said his multiple certificates should not be taken as the standard.
“I know so much because it is my hobby,” Lin said.
Convenience store clerks already have a lot of work to do and they do not need to be able to save people, Lin said, adding that many employees are part-time students.
Lin said that instead of encouraging people to learn skills and gain certificates, the government should have more automatic external defibrillators (AED) at stores.
Teaching part-time staff how to operate AEDs would be more practical than having them obtain a certificate, Lin said, adding that disaster prevention should be taught as early as elementary school.
Teachers should disseminate disaster prevention knowledge, Lin said.
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