The Ministry of Culture is today to start taking applications for subsidies under the second phase of its relief program to help the arts and culture sector.
Individuals and businesses affected by the COVID-19 pandemic can apply regardless of whether they had previously applied for subsidies under the initial phase designed to help cover operational costs, the ministry said.
As of April 10, it had received 7,874 applications for first-phase subsidies for individuals and businesses affected by the pandemic between Jan. 15 and March, it said.
Photo courtesy of Performance Workshop
The second phase of the program involves two types of subsides that aim to help cover workers’ salaries and companies’ operational costs incurred from last month to next month, it said.
The first type, for which applications are to close on June 10, provides businesses up to NT$2.5 million (US$83,5887) to help pay for employees’ salaries and other operational costs, it said.
Individuals would be eligible for a maximum payment of NT$60,000, it said, but added that those who receive subsidies from the culture ministry would be disqualified from the subsidies that the Ministry of Labor offers to self-employed people and workers without a fixed employer.
The second type aims to help bigger companies with a large number of employees, which have seen their income decline at least 50 percent since January, the culture ministry said, adding that applications for this program would end on July 31.
For such companies, the culture ministry is offering to help cover up to 40 percent of each employee’s salary — for a maximum of NT$20,000 per person — as well as other operating costs, it said.
Companies that are approved to receive subsidies under this scheme may not reduce employees’ working hours, lay off employees, cut salaries or take other forms of action that impair workers’ rights as long as they receive subsidies, the culture ministry said.
The second subsidy type is expected to require a NT$2.47 billion budget over three months, it added.
Companies that qualify for both types of subsidies may apply for either one, the culture ministry said.
It added that the NT$2.5 million subsidy limit under the former scheme does not apply to companies seeking subsidies under the latter scheme.
The Taipei Department of Health yesterday said it has launched a probe into a restaurant at Far Eastern Sogo Xinyi A13 Department Store after a customer died of suspected food poisoning. A preliminary investigation on Sunday found missing employee health status reports and unsanitary kitchen utensils at Polam Kopitiam (寶林茶室) in the department store’s basement food court, the department said. No direct relationship between the food poisoning death and the restaurant was established, as no food from the day of the incident was available for testing and no other customers had reported health complaints, it said, adding that the investigation is ongoing. Later
REVENGE TRAVEL: A surge in ticket prices should ease this year, but inflation would likely keep tickets at a higher price than before the pandemic Scoot is to offer six additional flights between Singapore and Northeast Asia, with all routes transiting Taipei from April 1, as the budget airline continues to resume operations that were paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a Scoot official said on Thursday. Vice president of sales Lee Yong Sin (李榮新) said at a gathering with reporters in Taipei that the number of flights from Singapore to Japan and South Korea with a stop in Taiwan would increase from 15 to 21 each week. That change means the number of the Singapore-Taiwan-Tokyo flights per week would increase from seven to 12, while Singapore-Taiwan-Seoul
POOR PREPARATION: Cultures can form on food that is out of refrigeration for too long and cooking does not reliably neutralize their toxins, an epidemiologist said Medical professionals yesterday said that suspected food poisoning deaths revolving around a restaurant at Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 Store in Taipei could have been caused by one of several types of bacterium. Ho Mei-shang (何美鄉), an epidemiologist at Academia Sinica’s Institute of Biomedical Sciences, wrote on Facebook that the death of a 39-year-old customer of the restaurant suggests the toxin involved was either “highly potent or present in massive large quantities.” People who ate at the restaurant showed symptoms within hours of consuming the food, suggesting that the poisoning resulted from contamination by a toxin and not infection of the
BAD NEIGHBORS: China took fourth place among countries spreading disinformation, with Hong Kong being used as a hub to spread propaganda, a V-Dem study found Taiwan has been rated as the country most affected by disinformation for the 11th consecutive year in a study by the global research project Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem). The nation continues to be a target of disinformation originating from China, and Hong Kong is increasingly being used as a base from which to disseminate that disinformation, the report said. After Taiwan, Latvia and Palestine ranked second and third respectively, while Nicaragua, North Korea, Venezuela and China, in that order, were the countries that spread the most disinformation, the report said. Each country listed in the report was given a score,