With the approach of Tropical Storm Talim, lawmakers yesterday agreed to postpone a provisional session of the legislature to discuss a proposal to ease restrictions on imports of US beef containing ractopamine residue until next month.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus whip Lin Hung-chih (林鴻池) said the extra session, pushed for by President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), and initially planned for today and tomorrow, could be postponed until the middle of next month.
The proposal to levy a capital gains tax on securities investments and a confirmation vote on Premier Sean Chen’s (陳冲) nominations for the National Communications Commission (NCC) could also be placed on the agenda for the extra session, Lin said.
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times
Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) called a meeting of party caucus representatives yesterday amid concerns that the legislature could get caught up in wrangling over the ractopamine issue when heavy rains are set to lash many parts of the nation.
Ma, who doubles as KMT chairman, had instructed the KMT legislators to call an extra session this week to vote on an amendment to Act Governing Food Sanitation (食品衛生管理法) that would ease the ban on ractopamine-tainted beef after the first session of the eighth legislature ended on Friday without passing the bill.
Although Ma was keen to see the bill passed, he is more worried about the effects of the weather systems, Wang said.
“President Ma is concerned about the expected heavy rainfall and the approaching storms,” Wang said.
“It will require further discussion among the ruling and opposition party caucuses to decide when to hold the extraordinary session,” the speaker said.
Wang said the legislators needed to return to their constituencies to help handle disaster preparedness and relief.
The opposition parties have criticized Ma for rushing to have an extra session to resolve the issue before the 35th session of the Codex Alimentarius Commission, which develops international standards for food, early next month because it is highly likely that the commission will once again reject the draft maximum residue levels for ractopamine.
The Democratic Progressive Party, the Taiwan Solidarity Union and the People First Party have demanded that the provisional session be held after the commission concludes its discussions of the matter at its annual session from July 2 to July 7 in Rome.
Executive Yuan spokesperson Hu Yu-wei (胡幼偉) on Sunday said the Cabinet “will not ease the ban on leanness-enhancer ractopamine with an administrative decree” before the legislature closes a provisional session.
The Executive Yuan said yesterday that it would respect Wang’s decisions on when to hold the extra session and what to put on the agenda.
If the provisional session was postponed, there was no reason not to wait until the one-month negotiation period ends on July 8 for a vote on a capital gains tax on securities transactions to be held and not to place a vote on the nominees for the National Communications Commission on the agenda, Wang said.
The four commission nominees are to replace four sitting members who are scheduled to complete their term of office and step down by the end of next month.
Additional reporting by CNA
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
BITTERLY COLD: The inauguration ceremony for US president-elect Donald Trump has been moved indoors due to cold weather, with the new venue lacking capacity A delegation of cross-party lawmakers from Taiwan, led by Legislative Speaker Han Kuo-yu (韓國瑜), for the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump, would not be able to attend the ceremony, as it is being moved indoors due to forecasts of intense cold weather in Washington tomorrow. The inauguration ceremony for Trump and US vice president-elect JD Vance is to be held inside the Capitol Rotunda, which has a capacity of about 2,000 people. A person familiar with the issue yesterday said although the outdoor inauguration ceremony has been relocated, Taiwan’s legislative delegation has decided to head off to Washington as scheduled. The delegation
Another wave of cold air would affect Taiwan starting from Friday and could evolve into a continental cold mass, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Temperatures could drop below 10°C across Taiwan on Monday and Tuesday next week, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. Seasonal northeasterly winds could bring rain, he said. Meanwhile, due to the continental cold mass and radiative cooling, it would be cold in northern and northeastern Taiwan today and tomorrow, according to the CWA. From last night to this morning, temperatures could drop below 10°C in northern Taiwan, it said. A thin coat of snow
RSS