Bed and breakfast (B&B) operators in Penghu County are to be disqualified from receiving government subsidies if they deliberately inflate room prices for the second phase of “disease prevention tours,” Minister of Transportation and Communications Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) said yesterday.
Lin told reporters after attending a news conference about an outdoor children’s theater production — a partnership between Taiwan High Speed Rail Corp (THSRC) and the Paper Windmill Theatre (紙風車劇團) — that is to take place near Taichung High Speed Rail Station on Saturday to celebrate Father’s Day.
The government’s tourism stimulus package has helped travelers experience high-quality domestic tours, and B&B operators should not kill the goose that lays the golden eggs, Lin said.
Photo: Cheng Wei-chi, Taipei Times
“The Tourism Bureau told Penghu County Government officials that operators found to engage in this kind of behavior a second time should be disqualified from applying for tourism subsidies,” Lin said. “Local government officials must thoroughly enforce the Consumer Protection Act (消費者保護法) and hold offenders accountable.”
Subsidies for the second phase of “disease prevention tours” are to be available until the end of October, Lin said.
As more people are heading to attractions in Yilan, Hualien, Taitung and the outlying islands, the bureau would step up campaigns to promote travel destinations in northern and central Taiwan to help divert the crowds, he said.
Cities and counties seeing a large influx of visitors would be asked to suspend tourism marketing events during the summer, Lin said, adding that the bureau would also be postponing marketing subsidies for those areas.
To ease traffic congestion in the Hsuehshan Tunnel during the Mid-Autumn Festival in October, the National Freeway Bureau would implement measures to redirect the traffic, Lin said.
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications would reinforce public transport connecting the east and west coasts, Lin said.
For example, the Yilan Railway Station would be turned into a hub to accommodate a high-speed rail extension line and an express railway system, he said, adding that the number of buses heading to the east coast would also be increased.
The platform providing motorists with updated traffic information would be improved so that it could help the freeway bureau identify the most effective ways to free up freeway traffic, he said.
On Thursday last week, THSRC resumed normal service, along with the rebound in domestic tourism.
The numbers of High-speed rail passengers declined significantly during the first half of this year due to the COVID-19 outbreak, causing the company to reduce services.
Taiwan is stepping up plans to create self-sufficient supply chains for combat drones and increase foreign orders from the US to counter China’s numerical superiority, a defense official said on Saturday. Commenting on condition of anonymity, the official said the nation’s armed forces are in agreement with US Admiral Samuel Paparo’s assessment that Taiwan’s military must be prepared to turn the nation’s waters into a “hellscape” for the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA). Paparo, the commander of the US Indo-Pacific Command, reiterated the concept during a Congressional hearing in Washington on Wednesday. He first coined the term in a security conference last
Prosecutors today declined to say who was questioned regarding alleged forgery on petitions to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators, after Chinese-language media earlier reported that members of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Youth League were brought in for questioning. The Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau confirmed that two people had been questioned, but did not disclose any further information about the ongoing investigation. KMT Youth League members Lee Hsiao-liang (李孝亮) and Liu Szu-yin (劉思吟) — who are leading the effort to recall DPP caucus chief executive Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) and Legislator Wu Pei-yi (吳沛憶) — both posted on Facebook saying: “I
Sung Chien-liang (宋建樑), who led efforts to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lee Kun-cheng (李坤城), was released on bail of NT$80,000 today amid outcry over his decision to wear a Nazi armband to questioning the night before. Sung arrived at the New Taipei District Prosecutors’ Office for questioning in a recall petition forgery case last night wearing a red armband bearing a swastika, carrying a copy of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf and giving a Nazi salute. Sung left the building at 1:15am without the armband and covering the book with his coat. Lee said today that this is a serious
A mountain blaze that broke out yesterday morning in Yangmingshan National Park was put out after five hours, following multi agency efforts involving dozens of fire trucks and helicopter water drops. The fire might have been sparked by an air quality sensor operated by the National Center for High-Performance Computing, one of the national-level laboratories under the National Applied Research Laboratories, Yangmingshan National Park Headquarters said. The Taipei City Fire Department said the fire, which broke out at about 11am yesterday near the mountainous Xiaoyoukeng (小油坑) Recreation Area was extinguished at 4:32pm. It had initially dispatched 72 personnel in four command vehicles, 16
RSS