The New Power Party (NPP) on Tuesday proposed a resolution to request that the Ministry of Education release within one week a list of university professors who have concurrently held illegal posts as directors at companies and for-profit organizations.
NPP Executive Chairman Huang Kuo-chang (黃國昌) made the proposal during cross-caucus negotiations at the Legislative Yuan in Taipei on the central government’s general budget for this year.
He said that he had asked the ministry to reveal the names of the educators, where they worked illegally and what disciplinary measures were carried out, but the ministry only provided statistics, saying that there were privacy concerns.
Photo: George Tsorng, Taipei Times
As long as privacy is not a real issue, the ministry should provide any information legislators need, Legislative Speaker Su Jia-chyuan (蘇嘉全) said, adding that “privacy rights should not become an excuse for protecting educators who have broken the law.”
Democratic Progressive Party caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) suggested passing a resolution requesting that the ministry release the names of all professors found to have illegally worked as independent directors and Su agreed.
The resolution to provide the professors’ names, their school and department, company or organization and their university’s responses would require the minister of education to submit the information within one week and present a briefing on the matter to the legislature’s Education and Culture Committee.
While the committee had previously decided to cut the National Palace Museum’s NT$860 million (US$27.9 million) renovation budget by NT$200 million and freeze an additional NT$200 million until museum officials brief lawmakers on the details of renovation projects, legislators on Tuesday agreed to not cut the budget and raise the frozen amount to NT$300 million after museum Director Chen Chi-nan (陳其南) requested a larger budget during negotiations.
Regarding the Financial Supervisory Commission’s budget, NPP Legislator Hsu Yung-ming (徐永明) proposed setting it aside for future discussion after a commission representative displayed a poor attitude, but Su only agreed to set aside parts of the budget that do not regularly occur.
Su also decided to leave the budget for the Ministry of Finance’s performance bonuses for tax officials for the plenary session after lawmakers across party lines expressed doubts over its legal basis.
Negotiations continued past midnight, and by early morning yesterday, legislators had reached a consensus on the central government’s education, economic and financial budgets.
They are today to continue negotiations on the budgets for transportation, communications, social welfare and other areas.
Decisions made during cross-caucus negotiations still require approval in a plenary session before taking effect.
Taiwan is to receive the first batch of Lockheed Martin F-16 Block 70 jets from the US late this month, a defense official said yesterday, after a year-long delay due to a logjam in US arms deliveries. Completing the NT$247.2 billion (US$7.69 billion) arms deal for 66 jets would make Taiwan the third nation in the world to receive factory-fresh advanced fighter jets of the same make and model, following Bahrain and Slovakia, the official said on condition of anonymity. F-16 Block 70/72 are newly manufactured F-16 jets built by Lockheed Martin to the standards of the F-16V upgrade package. Republic of China
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