On April 28, the Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister newspaper) ran an opinion piece titled “There’s no problem child in special education classes.” As mentioned, “Many countries have anti-discrimination laws ... our country does not have this kind of law.”
The meaning of this statement is not precise enough, and it needs to be clarified.
While there is no exclusive law against discriminatory language or behavior in Taiwan, there are a number of legal provisions against such language or behavior scattered throughout the nation’s laws.
After a case in 2016 in which a woman surnamed Hung (洪) verbally abused two military veterans, then-Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chairwoman Hung Hsiu-chu (洪秀柱) instructed the KMT legislative caucus to propose an “anti-racial discrimination law” to the Legislative Yuan.
At that time, I also published an editorial in the newspaper titled “Do we need an anti-racial discrimination law?” arguing that there was no need to enact separate legislation.
Article 62, Paragraph 1 of the Immigration Act (入出境及移民法) states, “Any person shall not discriminate against people residing in the Taiwan Area on the basis of nationality, race, color, class and place of birth.”
Paragraph 2 states: “Any person whose rights are trespassed due to the discrimination mentioned in the preceding Paragraph can file a complaint to the competent authorities on the basis of the situations of the trespass, unless the matter is regulated by other laws otherwise.”
Article 81 of the act states, “When the competent authority receives a complaint set forth in Article 62 and believes that the matters violate such a provision, it shall notify the person who violates the law to improve within the specified period in the order. If after the lapse of such period, the person still does not improve, he/she shall be fined not less than NT$5,000 and not more than NT$30,000.”
I was once a member of the “complaints review committee against discrimination of people residing in the Taiwan area” under the Ministry of the Interior, responsible for handling public complaints.
Article 5 of the Employment Service Act (就業服務法) also states: “For the purpose of ensuring a national’s equal opportunity in employment, an employer is prohibited from discriminating against any job applicant or employee on the basis of race, class, language, thought, religion, political party, place of origin, place of birth, gender, gender orientation, age, marital status, appearance, facial features, disability, horoscope, blood type, or past membership in any labor union; matters stated clearly in other laws shall be followed in priority.”
Violators are subject to the penalties stipulated in Article 65 of the act.
Article 16 of the People with Disabilities Rights Protection Act (身心障礙者權益保障法), as well as several other laws, also mention the prevention of discrimination.
There are some existing anti-discrimination laws in Taiwan, but they are targeted at specific groups and limited to specific areas.
With such fragmentation, Taiwan might consider consolidating the provisions to formulate an exclusive anti-discrimination law for several types of discriminatory words and behaviors, so it can be easily understood and applied by all.
Yu Ying-fu is a lawyer.
Translated by Eddy Chang
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