The Organic Laws and Statutes Com-mittee yesterday dismissed a Cabinet bill to overhaul the makeup of the National Assembly on the grounds that it was not responsible for legislation left over from the last legislative session.
Committee members across party lines frowned on the bill, which they said is aimed at strengthening a body that should act as a non-regular task force in line with a constitutional amendment.
"The committee will not review the bill, as it was submitted before the [present] legislature took office," said DPP lawmaker Lin Cho-shui (
To respect the discretion of new legislators, the Legislative Yuan adopted an internal reform proposal last year that removed bills that had failed to become laws from the legislative calendar.
Parties intent on reactivating a bill have to reintroduce it to the lawmaking body.
To prevent a repeat of pending bills becoming outdated, the committee attached a resolution requiring the Central Election Commission to shorten the time lag between legislative elections and inaugurations of lawmakers.
The proposed change, Lin said, is intended to deny outgoing legislators the opportunity to ram through legislation before their term expires.
The Cabinet bill to remake the National Assembly was introduced in early January, one month before the current session began.
Chen Ching-te (陳金德), another DPP legislator, slammed the Cabinet version of the bill as unconstitutional, because it proposed giving the National Assembly the right to call public hearings, investigate evidence and question witnesses.
Chen noted that constitutional amendments passed in 2000 made clear the intention to reduce the National Assembly to an ad hoc body that would only convene to confirm constitutional-reform bills proposed by the legislature.
Voicing a similar complaint, KMT lawmaker Alex Tsai (蔡正元) said that the Cabinet should ensure that the Assembly remains a figurehead group when seeking to redefine its powers and functions.
As former members of the National Assembly, Chen and Tsai were both deeply involved in the inter-party talks that led to the 2000 constitutional reform.
Noting that the law must be revised by May 18, PFP lawmaker Chin Huei-chu (秦慧珠) urged the Cabinet to submit a new version of the bill without delay.
"The Cabinet must hurry up or the legislature may not have enough time to review the legislation," Chin said.
Taiwanese barista Xie Yi-chen (謝溢宸) recently triumphed at the 2024 World Coffee Championships, taking home 1st place in the World Latte Art category. Xie, 28, impressed the judges in the final round with patterns of a whale, a moose, and a dragon in the three-day competition that took place in Copenhagen, Denmark from June 27-29, clinching the title of latte art world champion during his first time representing Taiwan on the world stage. At a press conference held by the Taiwan Coffee Association on Thursday, Xie said that creating latte art gives him a tremendous feeling of achievement. Speaking about his entries in
TRAVEL CONVENIENCE: The program is to shorten wait times while passing through airport checks and would start for Taiwanese from January next year Japan is to launch a new program to expedite entry procedures for Taiwanese starting from January next year. The Japanese government is planning to introduce new rules to shorten the time it takes foreign travelers to pass through immigration, thereby attracting more tourists to visit, Japanese public broadcaster NHK reported yesterday. An airport preclearance program would be implemented to allow foreign travelers to finish some screenings at their departure airport’s terminals and undergo simple confirmation procedures upon arrival, it said. The program would initially be applied to travelers from Taiwan from January next year and could be extended to travelers from elsewhere depending
The annual Taipei Summer Festival, which starts today, is to tone down its fireworks displays, the Taipei Department of Information and Tourism said on Monday. Fireworks displays are to be held at the riverside site in Datong District’s (大同) Dadaocheng (大稻埕) area on four days at this year’s festival, with the first today, and then on Wednesday next week, July 31 and Aug. 10, the department said. There were eight displays last year, with the reduction aimed at minimizing inconvenience to local residents, it said. The first three shows, which are all on Wednesdays, are to last for five minutes, while the final
EYE ON MAYORS: The DPP would file a complaint with the Control Yuan against Ko and Chiang over their handling of reports of abuse at a preschool in the city The Taipei City Government’s belated response under Mayor Chiang Wan-an (蔣萬安) and his predecessor, Taiwan People’s Party Chairman Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), to alleged child sex abuse at a kindergarten resulted in more children being victimized, two Taipei City Councilors said yesterday. A Taipei preschool teacher has been charged with sexually abusing six children from 2021 to last year at a school registered to his mother. Prosecutors are reportedly considering additional charges amid a wave of new accusations allegedly linking the suspect to 20 other abused children and the discovery at his residence of more than 600 sexually explicit videos featuring minors. The