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EDITORIAL: Message to
lawmakers: Do your job
The Legislative Yuan began its extra session yesterday in what has now become a
ritual: For the past few years, no legislative session has ended without the
need for an additional session.
In addition, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) said that as there were too
many outstanding proposals, it has planned not one, but two extra sessions.
While legislative inefficiency occurs in many countries, the “extra session”
phenomenon — unquestionably one of the trademarks of Taiwan’s legislature, along
with occasional brawls — is a serious concern.
It brings to mind an issue that angers many employers: employees working
overtime for no other reason than to receive overtime pay.
According to an estimate made by The Journalist magazine last year, one extra
day of sessions costs NT$10.25 million (US$342,300). In other words, the extra
two-week session is expected to cost taxpayers NT$143.5 million.
However, it is much more than an issue of money.
Lawmakers are called lawmakers for a reason — they make laws, which is the
mandate bestowed upon them by millions of voters across the country.
Unfortunately, legislators have not been doing their job. Too often during
sessions, lawmakers spend the time humiliating officials or asking irrelevant
questions, knowing that the media — TV crews in particular — eagerly await their
soundbites. They provide the “showmanship” that the media want, but that is a
topic for another day.
Yet, those who do attend legislative committee meetings are still more
commendable than those who do not even show up and believe that making
connections in their constituencies is more important for winning elections than
legislating.
If the Democratic Progressive Party has to worry about its lawmakers not
attending committee meetings, the KMT has even more to worry about.
A lack of effort, along with political differences between parties, is why
little was achieved in the regular session and most legislation that was passed
has done so as part of package deals after cross-party negotiation.
Over the years, not even changes in the constituency map, the legislature’s
structure nor internal regulations have changed this phenomenon.
The recent controversy over an amendment to the Accounting Act (會計法) has
highlighted the absurdity and incompetence of lawmakers at an unprecedented
level, with closed-door deals and a bizarre omission in the proposal’s text that
was supposed to have exempted hundreds of university professors from charges of
misusing receipts to claim government reimbursements.
Outraged at the secrecy, the blatant politicking and the sheer stupidity of the
omission, the public finally made its voice heard, forcing an Executive Yuan
veto and apologies from President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) and all political parties.
In some cases, lawmakers do not make enough laws, as was the case in the recent
industrial starch food scandal. Government agencies either found that there was
no law regulating the matter, or else they had no idea which agency was actually
in charge of the function.
If what has happened serves as any warning to legislators, the message is surely
loud and clear: Lawmakers should be doing their jobs and not needing two extra
sessions in which to do them.
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