The legislature yesterday enacted the Family Proceedings Act (家事事件處理法) to accelerate the pace of trials in family-related cases and protect disadvantaged women and children.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Pan Wei-kang (潘維剛) said the act was more progressive than similar acts in countries like Japan and Germany, mainly because it allowed for consolidation of trials of related offenses.
As an example, in line with the principle of consolidated trials, in proceedings for divorce, related cases such as child-rearing expenses and child custody may be jointly tried, to save the parties involved time and energy.
At present, trials in family--related cases are governed under the Civil Procedure Code (民事訴訟法) and Non-Contentious Case Act (非訟事件法).
Under the current system, a parent who rears a child after divorce must file a civil lawsuit for any child support that the defendant has failed to pay and must have a family proceedings court decision to force the defendant to pay maintenance.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Huang Sue-ying (黃淑英) said the act was designed to protect the rights and interests of those who are disadvantaged in a marriage.
The act stipulates that proceedings in family courts be held in private and the decisions not be made public, except with the informed consent of all parties involved, Huang said.
Juveniles appearing in courts shall be accompanied by social workers and family courts shall conduct gender equality awareness programs for judges and staff to avoid gender-biased decisions, the act said.
The legislature also approved an amendment to the Consumer Debt Clearance Act (消費者債務清理條例) to ease restrictions on credit card debtors’ ability to negotiate debt settlement with lenders, which could affect about 850,000 credit card debtors who are trying to clear their debts.
Since the act was passed three years ago, only 24 percent of applications for debt repayment negotiations were approved, and only 10 percent of debtors were declared exempt from repaying their debts, DPP Legislator Chen Chieh-ju (陳節如) said.
“The act was not effective to facilitate debt settlements,” Chen said.
In Japan, 82 percent of debt repayment negotiations are approved, and the debt exemption rate for debtors is about 95 percent, Chen said.
KMT Legislator Hsieh Kuo--liang (謝國樑) said that under the amended act, courts shall rule in favor of debtors against banks as long as the debtors have regular incomes and are willing to repay the debts to the best of their abilities.
Police have issued warnings against traveling to Cambodia or Thailand when others have paid for the travel fare in light of increasing cases of teenagers, middle-aged and elderly people being tricked into traveling to these countries and then being held for ransom. Recounting their ordeal, one victim on Monday said she was asked by a friend to visit Thailand and help set up a bank account there, for which they would be paid NT$70,000 to NT$100,000 (US$2,136 to US$3,051). The victim said she had not found it strange that her friend was not coming along on the trip, adding that when she
TRAGEDY: An expert said that the incident was uncommon as the chance of a ground crew member being sucked into an IDF engine was ‘minuscule’ A master sergeant yesterday morning died after she was sucked into an engine during a routine inspection of a fighter jet at an air base in Taichung, the Air Force Command Headquarters said. The officer, surnamed Hu (胡), was conducting final landing checks at Ching Chuan Kang (清泉崗) Air Base when she was pulled into the jet’s engine for unknown reasons, the air force said in a news release. She was transported to a hospital for emergency treatment, but could not be revived, it said. The air force expressed its deepest sympathies over the incident, and vowed to work with authorities as they
A tourist who was struck and injured by a train in a scenic area of New Taipei City’s Pingsi District (平溪) on Monday might be fined for trespassing on the tracks, the Railway Police Bureau said yesterday. The New Taipei City Fire Department said it received a call at 4:37pm on Monday about an incident in Shifen (十分), a tourist destination on the Pingsi Railway Line. After arriving on the scene, paramedics treated a woman in her 30s for a 3cm to 5cm laceration on her head, the department said. She was taken to a hospital in Keelung, it said. Surveillance footage from a
INFRASTRUCTURE: Work on the second segment, from Kaohsiung to Pingtung, is expected to begin in 2028 and be completed by 2039, the railway bureau said Planned high-speed rail (HSR) extensions would blanket Taiwan proper in four 90-minute commute blocs to facilitate regional economic and livelihood integration, Railway Bureau Deputy Director-General Yang Cheng-chun (楊正君) said in an interview published yesterday. A project to extend the high-speed rail from Zuoying Station in Kaohsiung to Pingtung County’s Lioukuaicuo Township (六塊厝) is the first part of the bureau’s greater plan to expand rail coverage, he told the Liberty Times (sister paper of the Taipei Times). The bureau’s long-term plan is to build a loop to circle Taiwan proper that would consist of four sections running from Taipei to Hualien, Hualien to
RSS