Former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) chairperson Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday called on the administration of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to usher in both pension and fiscal reforms, which she said could be achieved only through dialogue between representatives from all sectors of society, rather than pro-forma meetings of government officials or political party heads.
Tsai made the remark after Ma held a meeting yesterday with heads of the Executive Yuan, the legislature and the Examination Yuan to discuss problems related to the nation’s ailing pension systems, rather than through a national affairs conference as she and the DPP have proposed.
Reiterating her call for national affairs conferences on pension reform, Tsai said Taiwan is a democratic society that valued public participation, and that such meetings could serve as an ideal platform and mechanism to forge public consensus on resolutions to tackle various pressing social matters.
National affairs conferences are particularly needed at a time when administrative and legislative branches, either because of their limited jurisdictions or representations of different occupational groups, have failed to reach a consensus for the past month on adjustments of contentious year-end bonuses handed out to retired civil servants, Tsai said.
“If they could not even get on the same page on this matter, how much less can they carry out a full-fledged reform on several cash-strapped pension systems,” she said.
Tsai said that each of Taiwan’s current retirement and social insurance programs was closely intertwined with the core interest and financial security of individuals from different social sectors and occupational groups, making the issue critically complex.
“Whether they are public servants or our labor friends, they are part of the foundations of this country,” Tsai said. “We must not let the deficiencies of various pension systems become the source of social injustice and division.”
Tsai said what the country desperately needed was for specialists, academics and representatives from all sectors of society to sit down together to achieve consensuses via communication, help alleviate the financial burden on the shoulders of future generations and to jointly ride out the country’s financial difficulties.
Tsai said that she had proposed national affairs conferences for four reasons: the possible bankruptcy of pension systems, the country’s “fiscal cliff,” the lack of financial protection for the younger generations and a growing public anxiety.
“First, according to the latest calculations by administrative branches, all of the nation’s four major pension funds will go bankrupt within two decades, with the military personnel pension program in danger of running out of funds in 2017, the public school teachers pension fund in 2027, the Public Service Pension Fund in 2028 and the Labor Insurance Fund in 2031,” Tsai said.
Second, with growing public expenditure on retired armed forces personnel, civil servants and teachers placing a tremendous burden on the government, it could fall off a fiscal cliff eventually, Tsai said.
Third, the financial security of younger generations who have paid their premiums for decades and put in a lifetime of hard work could go down the drain should these pension funds go bust in the future, she said.
‘Fourth, the collapse of pension programs could also cost elderly people, who subsist on pensions, their life security, which means that the issue could have a profound impact not on one specific occupational group, but on all people from all sectors,” Tsai said.
Ensuring the sustainability of pension programs is one of the three objectives Tsai hoped to fulfill through a national affairs conference, which she said could be achieved by creating a healthy, balanced financial mechanism to assuage growing public anxiety.
Taiwan would welcome the return of Honduras as a diplomatic ally if its next president decides to make such a move, Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday. “Of course, we would welcome Honduras if they want to restore diplomatic ties with Taiwan after their elections,” Lin said at a meeting of the legislature’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, when asked to comment on statements made by two of the three Honduran presidential candidates during the presidential campaign in the Central American country. Taiwan is paying close attention to the region as a whole in the wake of a
President William Lai (賴清德) has appointed former vice president Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁) to attend the late Pope Francis’ funeral at the Vatican City on Saturday on his behalf, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said today. The Holy See announced Francis’ funeral would take place on Saturday at 10am in St Peter’s Square. The ministry expressed condolences over Francis’ passing and said that Chen would represent Taiwan at the funeral and offer condolences in person. Taiwan and the Vatican have a long-standing and close diplomatic relationship, the ministry said. Both sides agreed to have Chen represent Taiwan at the funeral, given his Catholic identity and
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫), spokeswoman Yang Chih-yu (楊智伃) and Legislator Hsieh Lung-chieh (謝龍介) would be summoned by police for questioning for leading an illegal assembly on Thursday evening last week, Minister of the Interior Liu Shyh-fang (劉世芳) said today. The three KMT officials led an assembly outside the Taipei City Prosecutors’ Office, a restricted area where public assembly is not allowed, protesting the questioning of several KMT staff and searches of KMT headquarters and offices in a recall petition forgery case. Chu, Yang and Hsieh are all suspected of contravening the Assembly and Parade Act (集會遊行法) by holding
Lawmakers from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) yesterday established a friendship group with their counterparts in Ukraine to promote parliamentary exchanges between the two countries. A ceremony in Taipei for the Taiwan-Ukraine Parliamentary Friendship Association, initiated by DPP Legislator Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷), was attended by lawmakers and officials, including Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Francois Wu (吳志中) and European Economic and Trade Office in Taiwan Director Lutz Gullner. The increasingly dire situation in Ukraine is a global concern, and Taiwan cannot turn its back when the latter is in need of help, as the two countries share many common values and interests,