A worker union has accused Taipei Metro of violating procurement rules, resulting in cleaning staff receiving fewer days of paid leave than they should be legally entitled to under labor rights law.
The Taiwan Labor Dispatch Industry Union (台灣勞動派遣產業工會) held a press conference at the Taipei City Council today denouncing the city-run Taipei Metro as “leave thieves.”
Photo: CNA
According to the union, the public transportation provider flouts provisions in the Government Procurement Act (政府採購法), resulting in cleaners who have worked at the company for 10 years only receiving three days of annual paid leave.
The press conference was jointly organized by the union's adviser Cheng Chung-jui (鄭中睿), the Confederation of Taipei Trade Unions Chair Chiu Yi-kan (邱奕淦), Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Taipei City Councilor Liu Tsai-wei (柳采葳) and Democratic Progressive Party Taipei City Councilor Ho Meng-hua (何孟樺).
Cheng said that all 652 cleaners working at Taipei Metro's 117 stations were outsourced, as of September last year.
He said Taipei Metro uses a two-year contract model with cleaning companies, and whenever the contract changes hands, the workers are dismissed and must be rehired by the new contractor.
As a result, workers’ years of employment are reset each time, Cheng said, and their paid leave accrual restarts as well.
He noted that under the Labor Standards Act (勞動基準法), an employee who has been working at a company for one year should receive seven days of annual leave, and those employed continuously for 10 years should receive 16 days of annual leave.
Cheng warned that without long-term contracts, many cleaners could face the situation of having worked for a decade or more but only receiving three days off annually.
The trade union adviser also accused the corporation of suppressing cleaners’ salaries by keeping them permanently at entry-level.
The outsourcing system means that “workers do not dare to resist to try to protect their rights and interests,” Cheng said, calling on the company to directly employ cleaners rather than outsource the positions.
He also demanded that Taipei Metro “immediately” audit and publicly disclose the employment duration of all outsourced cleaning staff.
In response, Chen Chung-Chu (陳忠助), director of the Station Operations Division at Taipei Metro, said the cleaning contracts include leave entitlements.
However, the metro official said the company would review its contracts to check for any discrepancies or noncompliance.
Taipei has once again made it to the top 100 in Oxford Economics’ Global Cities Index 2025 report, moving up five places from last year to 60. The annual index, which was published last month, evaluated 1,000 of the most populated metropolises based on five indices — economics, human capital, quality of life, environment and governance. New York maintained its top spot this year, placing first in the economics index thanks to the strength of its vibrant financial industry and economic stability. Taipei ranked 263rd in economics, 44th in human capital, 15th in quality of life, 284th for environment and 75th in governance,
Greenpeace yesterday said that it is to appeal a decision last month by the Taipei High Administrative Court to dismiss its 2021 lawsuit against the Ministry of Economic Affairs over “loose” regulations governing major corporate electricity consumers. The climate-related lawsuit — the first of its kind in Taiwan — sought to require the government to enforce higher green energy thresholds on major corporations to reduce emissions in light of climate change and an uptick in extreme weather. The suit, filed by Greenpeace East Asia, the Environmental Jurists Association and four individual plaintiffs, was dismissed on May 8 following four years of litigation. The
A former officer in China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) who witnessed the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre has warned that Taiwan could face a similar fate if China attempts to unify the country by force. Li Xiaoming (李曉明), who was deployed to Beijing as a junior officer during the crackdown, said Taiwanese people should study the massacre carefully, because it offers a glimpse of what Beijing is willing to do to suppress dissent. “What happened in Tiananmen Square could happen in Taiwan too,” Li told CNA in a May 22 interview, ahead of the massacre’s 36th anniversary. “If Taiwanese students or
The New Taipei City Government would assist relatives of those killed or injured in last month’s car-ramming incident in Sansia District (三峽) to secure compensation, Mayor Hou You-yi (侯友宜) said yesterday, two days after the driver died in a hospital. “The city government will do its best to help the relatives of the car crash incident seek compensation,” Hou said. The mayor also said that the city’s Legal Affairs, Education and Social Welfare departments have established a joint mechanism to “provide coordinated assistance” to victims and their families. Three people were killed and 12 injured when a car plowed into schoolchildren and their
RSS