Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Alex Fai (費鴻泰) yesterday asked the Executive Yuan to explore the possibility of allowing people to participate in electronic referendums using National Health Insurance (NHI) cards instead of Digital Citizen Certificates, which he said are troublesome to apply for.
It would be inconvenient if people were only allowed to use the certificates to vote in electronic referendums this year, Fai said at a question-and-answer session with Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) at the legislature in Taipei.
The certificate is used when filing taxes, with each household only needing one certificate, so only about 33 percent of the population has one, Fai said.
Fai said that people should be allowed to sign and vote in referendums using NHI cards.
People would have to spend NT$250 and make two trips to their district office to get a certificate, but they would likely use them just once in a referendum, he said.
However, every Tawianese has an NHI card, he said.
Su said that the proposal is probably not feasible, as unlike Digital Citizen Certificates, NHI cards do not have electronic ID authentication functionality.
Su said that after electronic national ID cards are introduced next year, people would be able to use them to vote in referendums.
The Central Election Commission is promoting electronic referendums after the KMT allegedly forged signatures of deceased people to help referendums it proposed last year pass initiation thresholds, Su said.
However, Fai said that it could work, as a policy he helped introduce in 2016 allows people to look up their tax information and file taxes online with no personal information leaks having been reported so far.
He asked the Cabinet explore the possibility and report its findings within a week, to which Su agreed.
Meanwhile, Council of Agriculture Minister Chen Chi-chung (陳吉仲) yesterday pledged to ensure steady supply of eggs amid a shortage and rising prices after a question from Fai.
The daily egg supply is 2,000 to 5,000 cartons below ideal output, Chen said, adding that the council would seek to tackle the problem by importing eggs.
However, Fai said that importing large quantities could drive up prices.
He said that the council should get to the bottom of recent price increases.
The council on Thursday rejected a report by online news outlet News&Market that rising egg prices were triggered by deficient batches of Marek’s disease vaccines.
The report said that the deficient vaccines had killed at least 1.6 million chicks.
Price rises are a result of the heavy flooding in central and southern cities and counties caused by southwesterly air currents in August last year and a ban on the use of fipronil at poultry farms, the council said.
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