The Examination Yuan is in charge of the hiring, evaluation, salaries and retirement of civil servants. Therefore, civil service pension system reform should be one of its main responsibilities, yet as the reform bill is about to be submitted to the legislature, several members of the Examination Yuan have tried to block it.
One member, Chou Yu-sun (周玉山), has attacked the government’s proposal as “vicious, cutting to the bone, leaving victims to bleed without listening to their cries of pain,” while another, Chou Tsu-lung (周志龍), has said that one-third of all retired civil servants will become “low-class old people.”
Many Examination Yuan members have vowed to come up with a counter-strategy.
The opposition to the reform effort within this institution is raising questions about its legitimacy, the work it does, the respect afforded to it and the need for its existence.
The Examination Yuan, one of the five branches of government prescribed by the Constitution, is unique. It was created because Sun Yat-sen (孫逸仙), looking to the examination system of imperial China, wanted to establish an independent examination power to avoid blind obedience and corruption.
As an independent, constitutionally ordained institution, there are no checks and balances on the Examination Yuan, which directs the systems and personnel plans that lie at the core of government operations. This frequently results in great discrepancies between the government’s personnel appointments and governance, and violates the principle of political accountability.
The Executive Yuan divides personnel administration matters into legal issues that it handles, and administrative issues handled by the Directorate-General of Personnel Administration to accommodate divisions between the five government branches.
This means there is not much for the Examination Yuan members to do. With the exception of a weekly meeting, they take turns chairing and serving as regular members of the Board of Examination and perhaps do some research.
They receive excellent benefits: In addition to a NT$190,000 (US$6,118) monthly salary and other benefits — the equivalent of a Cabinet minister — they also receive operating expenses of more than NT$2 million and a car and driver. Each year, the government spends between NT$70 million and NT$80 million on an Examination Yuan member.
If members are dedicated to their duties, it is reasonable that taxpayers should foot their supporting budget.
Pension system reform used to be the preserve of former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration and then-Examination Yuan president John Kuan (關中). It was precisely because the pampered members of the Examination Yuan abandoned their duties that a golden opportunity was missed and reform of the civil service pension system was delayed. The result is that even more drastic cuts to civil service pensions are now required.
Now that the members of the Examination Yuan are dealing with their own vested interests, they are not only neglecting their duties, but have become a stumbling block to reform. This is unacceptable.
The legislature must remove this obstacle by amending the Organic Act of the Examination Yuan (考試院組織法). It might not be possible to abolish the institution, as it is protected by the Constitution, but the number of members and their benefits should be sharply reduced.
Its mode of operation should also be amended, so that draft bills from the Ministry of Examination and the Ministry of Civil Service can be sent directly to the legislature to avoid a situation in which oppositional forces hijack reforms.
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