The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is to prioritize budget reviews and a whistle-blower protection bill during the new legislative session, party caucus secretary-general Lin Szu-ming (林思銘) said today.
This caucus is to prioritize amendments to the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法), the Senior Citizens Welfare Act (老人福利法), the Employment Service Act (就業服務法), the Fire Services Act (消防法) the Student Guidance and Counseling Act (學生輔導法), as well as a whistle-blower protection bill during the session that started today, he told a news conference.
Party caucus negotiations are to be held in the middle of this month, he said, adding that the sooner they can be held, the better.
Photo: Taipei Times
This session, the KMT is to strictly assess the general budget and additional budget items for the upcoming fiscal year, making necessary cuts to avoid the ineffective budget plans of previous years, he said.
Annual revenue this year is projected to reach NT$3.15 trillion (US$98.25 billion) and annual expenditure NT$3.13 trillion, both record highs.
Meanwhile, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) during the new session plans to prioritize the passage of four major budgets and personnel appointments, the party caucus said at a separate news conference.
The DPP has identified more than 40 priority bills, plus four budget-related bills and appointments to four agencies and branches, DPP caucus secretary-general Rosalia Wu (吳思瑤) said.
The appointments are to the National Communications Commission (NCC), the Examination Yuan, the Judicial Yuan and the Fair Trade Commission.
Nominees to the NCC and Examination Yuan were submitted last session, but have yet to be approved, while Judicial Yuan appointments were announced on Friday last week.
This session’s budget is to include an NT$100 billion subsidy to Taiwan Power Co as approved by the Cabinet last year, Wu said.
Additionally, this session is to prioritize public welfare, public protection and national security, Wu said.
Four bills are also to be proposed to develop physical education and sports, a priority of the administration following this year’s Olympics, she added.
GREAT POWER COMPETITION: Beijing views its military cooperation with Russia as a means to push back against the joint power of the US and its allies, an expert said A recent Sino-Russian joint air patrol conducted over the waters off Alaska was designed to counter the US military in the Pacific and demonstrated improved interoperability between Beijing’s and Moscow’s forces, a national security expert said. National Defense University associate professor Chen Yu-chen (陳育正) made the comment in an article published on Wednesday on the Web site of the Journal of the Chinese Communist Studies Institute. China and Russia sent four strategic bombers to patrol the waters of the northern Pacific and Bering Strait near Alaska in late June, one month after the two nations sent a combined flotilla of four warships
THE TOUR: Pope Francis has gone on a 12-day visit to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore. He was also invited to Taiwan The government yesterday welcomed Pope Francis to the Asia-Pacific region and said it would continue extending an invitation for him to visit Taiwan. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs made the remarks as Pope Francis began a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific on Monday. He is to travel about 33,000km by air to visit Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, East Timor and Singapore, and would arrive back in Rome on Friday next week. It would be the longest and most challenging trip of Francis’ 11-year papacy. The 87-year-old has had health issues over the past few years and now uses a wheelchair. The ministry said
TAIWANESE INNOVATION: The ‘Seawool’ fabric generates about NT$200m a year, with the bulk of it sourced by clothing brands operating in Europe and the US Growing up on Taiwan’s west coast where mollusk farming is popular, Eddie Wang saw discarded oyster shells transformed from waste to function — a memory that inspired him to create a unique and environmentally friendly fabric called “Seawool.” Wang remembered that residents of his seaside hometown of Yunlin County used discarded oyster shells that littered the streets during the harvest as insulation for their homes. “They burned the shells and painted the residue on the walls. The houses then became warm in the winter and cool in the summer,” the 42-year-old said at his factory in Tainan. “So I was
‘LEADERS’: The report highlighted C.C. Wei’s management at TSMC, Lisa Su’s decisionmaking at AMD and the ‘rock star’ status of Nvidia’s Huang Time magazine on Thursday announced its list of the 100 most influential people in artificial intelligence (AI), which included Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家), Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) and AMD chair and CEO Lisa Su (蘇姿丰). The list is divided into four categories: Leaders, Innovators, Shapers and Thinkers. Wei and Huang were named in the Leaders category. Other notable figures in the Leaders category included Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Meta CEO and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. Su was listed in the Innovators category. Time highlighted Wei’s