The Executive Yuan would consider other legal actions if its reconsideration requests do not pass the Legislative Yuan’s vote this afternoon, including proposing a new version of the budget, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said today.
The legislature met yesterday and today to review the Cabinet’s reconsideration requests for this year’s central government budget and amendments to the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) respectively.
Cho and other agency leaders presented reasoning for the requests and answered questions at the Legislative Yuan over the past two days.
Photo: CNA
The legislature plans to vote on the requests today following the question-and-answer session.
The possibility of the reconsideration requests passing is very low, Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lin Chun-hsien (林俊憲) said, asking if the Executive Yuan has a back-up plan.
The Executive Yuan is “prepared for the best, but is planning for the worst,” Cho said.
Its plans are all within the legal and constitutional scope, and there are only a few methods that can be used, he said.
When the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) amended the fiscal allocation law in 2012, local governments faced a financial shortfall of NT$58.9 billion (US$1.79 billion), Cho said.
However, after several years of DPP governance and increased local subsidies, the local budget surplus reached NT$64.8 billion in 2023, he said.
This year, the total budget, including general and project-based subsidies, as well as allocated tax revenues, would provide local governments with more than NT$1 trillion, he added.
Lin called the fiscal allocation law amendments unfair, saying that as a special municipality, Tainan has a larger population and area than Changhua County, but receives less funding.
The lawmaker said that Lienchiang County’s population is less than his legislative district, yet the average subsidy per citizen is less than one-10th of that in Lienchiang.
The law can be amended, but it should not be done so recklessly, he added.
Taiwan People's Party Legislator Vivian Huang (黃珊珊) asked Cho if the Executive Yuan would file a constitutional interpretation or hold a referendum if the reconsideration requests are not passed.
The Executive Yuan would consider actions that are legal and constitutional, including proposing a new version of the budget, Cho said.
The Executive Yuan had many proposals to discuss on Dec. 20 last year, but the Legislative Yuan did not leave time for discussion, Cho said.
Although the Executive Yuan had proposals, it needed to discuss with local governments before presenting them, he said.
The Ministry of Finance held a meeting with experts and local governments on Thursday last week, Minister of Finance Chuang Tsui-yun (莊翠雲) said.
Huang said that the Legislative Yuan requested the Cabinet propose a version of the fiscal allocation law last year, but it did not do so for more than half a year, accusing the current discussion of being a “big performance.”
DPP caucus chief executive Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) said that the reconsideration request is the first step in the democratic relief process.
If the request is unsuccessful, the caucus is prepared to file a constitutional interpretation and a provisional injunction, as these are also ways to safeguard the general budget and constitutional order, Wu said.
Additional reporting by Chen Cheng-yu
Kenting National Park service technician Yang Jien-fon (楊政峰) won a silver award in World Grand Prix Photography Awards Spring Season for his photograph of two male rat snakes intertwined in combat. Yang’s colleagues at Kenting National Park said he is a master of nature photography who has been held back by his job in civil service. The awards accept entries in all four seasons across six categories: architectural and urban photography, black-and-white and fine art photography, commercial and fashion photography, documentary and people photography, nature and experimental photography, and mobile photography. Awards are ranked according to scores and divided into platinum, gold and
More than half of the bamboo vipers captured in Tainan in the past few years were found in the city’s Sinhua District (新化), while other districts had smaller catches or none at all. Every year, Tainan captures about 6,000 snakes which have made their way into people’s homes. Of the six major venomous snakes in Taiwan, the cobra, the many-banded krait, the brown-spotted pit viper and the bamboo viper are the most frequently captured. The high concentration of bamboo vipers captured in Sinhua District is puzzling. Tainan Agriculture Bureau Forestry and Nature Conservation Division head Chu Chien-ming (朱健明) earlier this week said that the
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus yesterday said it opposes the introduction of migrant workers from India until a mechanism is in place to prevent workers from absconding. Minister of Labor Hung Sun-han (洪申翰) on Thursday told the Legislative Yuan that the first group of migrant workers from India could be introduced as early as this year, as part of a government program. The caucus’ opposition to the policy is based on the assessment that “the risk is too high,” KMT caucus secretary-general Lin Pei-hsiang (林沛祥) said. Taiwan has a serious and long-standing problem of migrant workers absconding from their contracts, indicating that
SPACE VETERAN: Kjell N. Lindgren, who helps lead NASA’s human spaceflight missions, has been on two expeditions on the ISS and has spent 311 days in space Taiwan-born US astronaut Kjell N. Lindgren is to visit Taiwan to promote technological partnerships through one of the programs organized by the US for its 250th national anniversary. Lindgren would be in Taiwan from Tuesday to Saturday next week as part of the US Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs’ US Speaker Program, organized to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) said in a statement yesterday. Lindgren plans to engage with key leaders across the nation “to advance cutting-edge technological partnerships and inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers,”
RSS