Cross-party negotiations over the central government’s budget for this year are expected to continue today after lawmakers failed to reach a consensus amid heated debate yesterday.
With more than 3,000 proposals to review, the three days originally scheduled might not be enough for negations, Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜) said.
If negotiations are not completed by tomorrow, the party caucuses should continue negotiations over the weekend, outside of plenary sessions, Han said.
Photo: CNA
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) caucuses were on the verge of proposing comprehensive cuts that would threaten to shut down multiple government ministries, Chinese-language media reported.
Cuts expected to be proposed by the KMT include suspending NT$1.8 billion (US$54.44 million) of the Ministry of National Defense’s NT$2 billion budget for an indigenous defense submarine program.
Other KMT proposals are expected to cut the operating budgets of the Ministry of Digital Affairs, the Ministry of Agriculture, the National Communications Commission (NCC) and the Mainland Affairs Council to NT$1 each, while other ministries would lose 70 percent of their operating budgets.
KMT caucus members called for all ministries to have their funding for public relations and media promotion struck entirely.
The proposals prompted criticism from officials, with several ministries warning that the normal functions of the government could not be maintained at the suggested funding levels.
Major General Hsin Yi-tsung (辛宜聰) from the Ministry of National Defense’s Comptroller Bureau said that a follow-up submarine construction program is a key part of the nation’s naval strategy and symbol of Taiwan’s resolve to defend itself.
The defense ministry urged lawmakers to pass the proposed submarine budget in its entirety to enable the navy to acquire eight boats as the legislature’s National Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee recommended, Hsin said.
Media reports that Minister of National Defense Wellington Koo (顧立雄) had agreed to cut the submarine budget following discussions with KMT lawmakers were false, Hsin said, adding that his ministry has made no changes to its policy recommendations.
The navy is completing harbor acceptance tests for a prototype submarine as planned and would never authorize additional vessels to be built without absolute confidence in their safety, Navy Deputy Chief of Staff Rear Admiral He Hung-hsuan (賀紘璿) said.
Minister of Health and Welfare Chiu Tai-yuan (邱泰源) told reporters on the sidelines of a legislative session that the government needs funding for public relations and media promotion to protect public health.
The government has important health initiatives, including expanded eligibility for free checkups for chronic diseases and cancer screenings, Chiu said.
A spokesperson for the Ministry of Digital Affairs said that cutting its operating budget to NT$1 would prevent officials from protecting Taiwan’s cybersecurity against state actors and scammers, or carrying out routine tasks to maintain Internet services.
NCC Secretary-General Huang Wen-che (黃文哲) said that the agency could not perform its regulatory functions or pay for office electricity bills if KMT lawmakers implement budget cuts as reported.
The Ministry of Agriculture in a statement said that the plan of the KMT and the TPP to cut its budget might lead to an unprecedented shutdown of its offices and services.
Such cuts would affect many things, including safety testing, occupational hazard insurance payouts for farmers, agricultural product information systems and benefits for elderly farmers, it said.
About 345,000 farmers are subscribed to the government-run farmers’ insurance system and 520,000 elderly farmers are entitled to benefits, it added.
Taiwan yesterday condemned the recent increase in Chinese coast guard-escorted fishing vessels operating illegally in waters around the Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the South China Sea. Unusually large groupings of Chinese fishing vessels began to appear around the islands on Feb. 15, when at least six motherships and 29 smaller boats were sighted, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said in a news release. While CGA vessels were dispatched to expel the Chinese boats, Chinese coast guard ships trespassed into Taiwan’s restricted waters and unsuccessfully attempted to interfere, the CGA said. Due to the provocation, the CGA initiated an operation to increase
A crowd of over 200 people gathered outside the Taipei District Court as two sisters indicted for abusing a 1-year-old boy to death attended a preliminary hearing in the case yesterday afternoon. The crowd held up signs and chanted slogans calling for aggravated penalties in child abuse cases and asking for no bail and “capital punishment.” They also held white flowers in memory of the boy, nicknamed Kai Kai (剴剴), who was allegedly tortured to death by the sisters in December 2023. The boy died four months after being placed in full-time foster care with the
A Taiwanese woman on Sunday was injured by a small piece of masonry that fell from the dome of St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican during a visit to the church. The tourist, identified as Hsu Yun-chen (許芸禎), was struck on the forehead while she and her tour group were near Michelangelo’s sculpture Pieta. Hsu was rushed to a hospital, the group’s guide to the church, Fu Jing, said yesterday. Hsu was found not to have serious injuries and was able to continue her tour as scheduled, Fu added. Mathew Lee (李世明), Taiwan’s recently retired ambassador to the Holy See, said he met
The Shanlan Express (山嵐號), or “Mountain Mist Express,” is scheduled to launch on April 19 as part of the centennial celebration of the inauguration of the Taitung Line. The tourism express train was renovated from the Taiwan Railway Corp’s EMU500 commuter trains. It has four carriages and a seating capacity of 60 passengers. Lion Travel is arranging railway tours for the express service. Several news outlets were invited to experience the pilot tour on the new express train service, which is to operate between Hualien Railway Station and Chihshang (池上) Railway Station in Taitung County. It would also be the first tourism service
RSS