Lawmakers yesterday agreed to extend the current legislative session by two weeks to complete the review of an additional budget request of NT$11 billion (US$380.62 million) for a 3 percent pay raise for civil servants.
The decision would ensure that the pay raise proposal takes effect on July 1, as scheduled by the government, should the legislature approve the budget request before the legislature recesses on June 14.
Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平) has called a meeting for party caucus whips to decide on items to be reviewed before the legislature goes into summer recess.
Lawmakers decided to extend the session to complete reviews of the pay raise budget, a budget request of NT$4.8 billion for monthly pensions to be distributed to more low-income households, NT$2.9 billion for tuition subsidies for children under the age of five and vocational high-school students from economically disadvantaged families, and a budget request for state-owned and non-government enterprises.
They also decided to schedule a confirmation vote on President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) four grand justice nominees — Chen Be-yue (陳碧玉), Huang Hsi-chun (黃璽君), Lo Chang-fa (羅昌發) and Tang Te-tsung (湯德宗) — before the recess begins.
The terms of four of the 15 incumbents on the Council of Grand Justices will end on Sept. 30.
New justices are to take the bench on Oct. 1 as required by law.
Death row inmate Huang Lin-kai (黃麟凱), who was convicted for the double murder of his former girlfriend and her mother, is to be executed at the Taipei Detention Center tonight, the Ministry of Justice announced. Huang, who was a military conscript at the time, was convicted for the rape and murder of his ex-girlfriend, surnamed Wang (王), and the murder of her mother, after breaking into their home on Oct. 1, 2013. Prosecutors cited anger over the breakup and a dispute about money as the motives behind the double homicide. This is the first time that Minister of Justice Cheng Ming-chien (鄭銘謙) has
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TRANSPORT CONVENIENCE: The new ticket gates would accept a variety of mobile payment methods, and buses would be installed with QR code readers for ease of use New ticketing gates for the Taipei metro system are expected to begin service in October, allowing users to swipe with cellphones and select credit cards partnered with Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC), the company said on Tuesday. TRTC said its gates in use are experiencing difficulty due to their age, as they were first installed in 2007. Maintenance is increasingly expensive and challenging as the manufacturing of components is halted or becoming harder to find, the company said. Currently, the gates only accept EasyCard, iPass and electronic icash tickets, or one-time-use tickets purchased at kiosks, the company said. Since 2023, the company said it
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
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