As the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) continued to promote their “contempt of the legislature” bills and made a farce of legislative procedure, the public took to the streets to protest, just as it did 10 years ago with the Sunflower movement.
The UK Parliament possesses high constitutional status and great authority, but it cannot abuse its powers.
First of all, a legislative reform bill is not a small deal. The proposal should be publicized in the first reading and drafted as a green or white paper for prior public consultation. The principle of the proposal should be clearly stated and submitted for legislative debate after the public reaches a consensus.
It is absurd that KMT legislators should be allowed to comply with Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) wishes and create such chaos in the legislature.
In the UK, in certain circumstances, parliament has the right to summon specific people and ask them to provide evidence or submit documents before a session. Only select committees that have passed the resolution possess this authority, and the committee would give people summoned parliamentary immunity so that they can speak freely.
If parliament wants to prosecute someone, the approval of a prosecutor is necessary. It is unreasonable for Taiwanese legislators to be able to prosecute those who refuse to obey.
The legislature needs reform, but as former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislator Lin Cho-shui (林濁水) has said, that reform should not introduce new crimes such as “contempt of legislature” and forget the basic responsibilities of lawmakers.
In addition, in the UK, the person elected to be the speaker of the House of Commons immediately withdraws from their party to show neutrality. Also, parties would not nominate candidates to compete for the seat of the speaker’s constituency.
In Taiwan, Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) has his own political stance and remains in the KMT, and this lacks neutrality. For anyone familiar with the Westminster system, it is preposterous that Han, in his current status, could become legislative speaker.
With the nonsensical proposals and the chaos, the legislature has lost its credibility in the eyes of the public. The KMT and the TPP should withdraw the proposals, or the legislature might face dissolution and realignment.
In many Western nations, if lawmakers behave unreasonably and uncontrollably, parliament would be dissolved and re-elected. Also, a constitutional reform committee would be established to let parties and the public discuss how to improve the parliament.
Although discontentment from the public has yet to reach this level, whether the legislature would soon face dissolution is hard to tell.
Martin Oei is a Hong Kong-born British political commentator based in Germany and a member of the UK’s Conservative Party.
Translated by Chien Yan-ru
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