Legislators from across party lines yesterday pledged support for major reforms to shorten the legal workweek, as the legislature’s Social Welfare and Environmental Hygiene Committee cleared amendments to the Labor Standards Act (勞動基準法).
If passed by the legislature’s plenary session later this month, the landmark piece of legislation would change regulations that define work hours as 84 hours per two weeks to 40 hours per week — effectively ensuring two days off per week.
The new policy is set to be implemented by next year and expected to benefit about 3.4 million workers in the private sector.
Photo: Huang Pang-ping, Taipei Times
However, the fate of a controversial clause that would increase the monthly limit for overtime work from 46 to 54 hours remained unclear, as the Executive Yuan’s version of the bill failed to reach the committee stage for review yesterday.
The move to raise the overtime cap provoked strong criticism from legislators from the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) alike.
DPP Legislator Chao Tien-ling (趙天麟) said that increasing the overtime limit by eight hours would render the other reforms meaningless, because shortening work hours to 40 hours per week decreased work hours by precisely eight hours per month.
He accused the government of treating the people like monkeys, citing a classic fable in which an old man appeased monkeys under his care by promising them four chestnuts at dawn and three at dusk, instead of the other way around.
Given that all 12 versions put forward by legislators shortened the workweek without stipulating an increase in overtime work, it made no sense for legislators to support the Executive Yuan’s version, Chao said.
In a show of bipartisan cooperation, KMT legislators supported Chao, with Lin Hung-chih (林鴻池), Wu Yu-jen (吳育仁), Chiang Hui-chen (江惠貞) and others taking to the speaker’s podium to speak out on the clause.
They said that while the Executive Yuan’s version contained certain progressive aspects — such as a clause that requires employers to compensate employees for unused holidays that have passed their half-year limit — the proposal to increase overtime hours stymied the otherwise positive reforms.
Legislators also agreed on other reforms such as increasing fines for those who violate labor regulations, extra pay for employees working on national holidays, and making workers eligible to apply for flexible work hours by one hour for family reasons.
Although the two-days-off-per-week policy has been in place in the public sector since 2001, only about 50.1 percent of companies in the private sector have followed suit, while the remaining 49.9 percent of private enterprises do not guarantee two days off a week.
While legislators reviewed the act, nearly 200 protesters led by Taiwan Labour Front rallied outside the Legislative Yuan compound to protest the proposed increase in the overtime work limit.
Holding bright yellow umbrellas, participants arranged themselves to form the number “40” in the middle of Jinan Rd outside the legislature, chanting: “Open up the protective umbrella for workers.”
Taiwan Labour Front secretary-general Son Yu-liam (孫友聯) said that Taiwanese suffered from overwork to a dangerous degree, with the nation’s annual average number of work hours ranked third in the world at 2,124 hours a year, surpassed by only South Korea and Mexico.
He urged the government to withdraw its proposal to increase overtime hours, adding that Taiwanese employers rarely offer overtime pay.
“We urge the government to help us fulfill our pitiful demand of a 40-hour workweek, something many other nations already achieved more than 100 years ago,” Son said.
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