The Ministry of Transportation and Communications (MOTC) should provide funding to help taxi drivers adjust to its plans to diversify the industry, advocates said yesterday, while threatening further protests if the government fails to follow through on promises to investigate allegations of tax evasion by ride-sharing app Uber.
Plans announced earlier this week call for dropping appearance regulations and price ceilings for certain taxis, while forbidding such taxis from coasting and accepting curbside hails, instead requiring them to only accept pre-booked passengers.
The plans are intended to give taxi drivers more flexibility to compete against Uber, which allows customers to choose from different vehicles and rates.
“We are not opposed to the plan, but there has to be appropriate supplementary measures,” Taxi and Intercity Bus Business Association president Liang Ping-liang (梁平良) said, adding that the government should assume responsibility for funding an app for the new type of taxis.
Government assistance is needed to integrate the different fleets’ existing apps and also because many drivers are independent, he said, adding that ensuring drivers and customers would still be able to find each other was a major concern.
“Given that you plan to take this measure, it is your responsibility to help us adjust,” Liang said, while reiterating calls for stronger measures against Uber, such as increasing rewards for people reporting illegal drivers, after remarks on Wednesday by Minister of Transportation and Communications Hochen Tan (賀陳旦) that competition with Uber “should not be a life-or-death struggle.”
“We are not opposed to Uber’s entrance, but it has to compete legally and fairly, which means no price wars,” Liang said, adding that Uber should be subject to similar insurance and driver qualification requirements as other taxi firms.
Taxi fare rates are currently fixed by local governments.
Liang said that his association would wait to see if the Ministry of Economic Affairs followed through on promises to consider withdrawing Uber’s business license before taking any further steps.
Taxi operators have said they would mobilize 2,000 drivers to park taxis around the ministry on Aug. 11 if the government continues to allow Uber to operate illegally.
Hochen on Wednesday said the government is exploring a variety of options to address the complaints surrounding Uber, one of which is ensuring that Uber’s business plan is actually consistent with the service it offers.
The Directorate-General of Highways would continue its crackdown on Uber drivers, he said, adding that he also hopes that taxi drivers could begin offering innovative products using the Internet.
The MOTC met with transportation experts to discuss the matter on Tuesday, Hochen said.
Most of the experts said taxi operators should be allowed to run their businesses using a variety of service models to suit a diverse range of customers, the minister said, adding that it was also suggested that passengers should be able to pay fares electronically.
In related news, the MOTC said it is bracing for a change in labor regulations to take effect on Monday.
The new policy prevents people from working more than six consecutive days, and is expected to lead to a reduction in bus and train services.
Meanwhile, the Taiwan Railways Administration (TRA) and Mandarin Airlines unions have both threatened to call strikes during the Mid-Autumn Festival in September after failing to reach an agreement with their respective managements.
Hochen said that the MOTC would continue to communicate with the Ministry of Labor over any issues that emerge after the new policy is implemented.
“TRA workers have been complaining about their deteriorating work environment, low salaries and personnel shortages for a long time. The government agency in charge of recruiting the government personnel has promised to help the TRA in this regard, and we respect the TRA Workers’ Union’s desire for a pay raise,” Hochen said.
Mandarin Airlines’ management and its union should seek to resolve their dispute by keeping lines of communication open, he said.
The TRA Workers’ Union has estimated that 200 train services would be canceled per day when the new policy takes effect on Monday.
However, TRA management said it only plans to cancel 10 cargo trains and several temporary train services in light of the enforcement of the new policy.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater