Brian Hioeby Brian Hioe
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Photo Credit: Chen Yu-chen/Facebook
NEW LEGISLATION advanced by Chen Yu-chen of the KMT was accused earlier this month of making it easier for legislators to embezzle government subsidies. After public backlash, it is uncertain where the bill currently sits, with the KMT legislative caucus suggesting that it does not have plans to discuss the bill and would suspend it until there was further discussion of it to achieve consensus, but Chen stating that she would not withdraw the bill.
Chen’s proposal would have allowed legislators to not have to provide invoices for reimbursement for subsidies meant for legislative assistants and related expenses. This has been accused of opening the door to political corruption, seeing as one of the most frequent reasons why legislators face arrest over corruption charges is because of embezzling fees meant for legislative assistants.
This is a frequent category of crime that ensnares both KMT and DPP legislators. For example, in July, DPP legislator Lin Dai-hua was charged with embezzling legislative assistant subsidies.
Legislators are able to hire between 8 and 14 assistants, with 472,000 NT per month in subsidies meant to pay them. As such, the new changes are accused of allowing legislators to embezzle this money instead, allowing legislators to pick up 7.8 million NT annually. Accusations are also that the new bill could allow for embezzlement of not only funds meant for legislative assistant subsidies, but also funds meant for medical expenses and training.
Moreover, Chen has been accused of seeking to defend KMT legislator Yen Kuan-heng, the scion of the Yen political dynasty in Taichung. Yen family patriarch Yen Ching-piao, the chair of the Dajia Jenn Lann Temple and the previous KMT legislator of Taichung before Yen Kuan-heng inherited his seat, has long been seen as a figure at the intersection of organized crime, religion, and electoral politics.
Yen Kuan-heng and his wife were indicted in 2023 for embezzling over 960,000 NT that was earmarked for legislative aide subsidies. Specifically, on paper, Yen hired Lin Chin-fu, the owner of a construction company seen as affiliated with the Yen family, from 2016 to 2020. But in reality, Yen kept the money that would have gone to his salary. Legislators are often accused of hiring family members or close associates when they, in fact, keep the money that supposedly goes to their salaries. Yen reportedly used the money to buy a Maserati.
Even if Chen’s bill is seen as aimed at protecting Yen, around the same time of the charges against Yen, TPP Hsinchu mayor Ann Kao, too, came under fire with legal charges that she had embezzled fees meant for assistants. Kao was accused of embezzling 460,030 NT by hiring her boyfriend as a legislative assistant, in spite of his having a monthly salary of 190,000 NT and more than 12 million NT in savings as an executive at Terry Gou’s Yonglin Foundation.
The legal case against Kao is still ongoing. Despite facing charges for embezzling fees meant for legislative assistants, Kao was also accused of restricting her assistants’ expenditures. This included for petty expenses, such as making legislative assistants pay the 10 NT transaction fee for booking high-speed rail tickets. Kao has faced allegations throughout her political career of living an expensive lifestyle, potentially at the expense of the public. In particular, Kao has been accused of living in an apartment worth more than 50 million NT, and being driven around the city in expensive vehicles such as Porsches and BMWs.
Arrests over embezzling legislative assistant fees is one of the recurring news stories of Taiwanese politics. If Chen’s bill does, in fact, make it easier for such graft to occur, this may no longer be the case.
Such recurrent controversies are ironic, when salaries for city councilor assistants remain low. In August 2023, city councilor assistants in Kaohsiung sought to unionize, seeing as salaries for city councilor assistants have remained the same for 23 years. Specifically, city councilors are partly subsidized by the government to pay for their assistants, but city councilors are still only provided 240,000 NT per year for such subsidies. As such, city councilors may not make more than 30,000 NT, which is just above the minimum salary of 26,400 NT. City councilor assistants pointed out that this does not keep pace with rising inflation, nor has it with the increases in the minimum wage from 17,240 to its current 26,400 NT–the 240,000 NT annual subsidy for city councilor assistants had not increased since 2000. The controversy points to unresolved equalities when it comes to assistants in the Taiwanese political system.
Indeed, perhaps unsurprisingly, Chen’s bill seems to have hit a nerve among legislative assistants. A union group representing legislative assistants has issued a petition against Chen’s bill, calling on Chen to withdraw it or for Legislative Yuan president Han Kuo-yu to intervene in the matter. The petition is criticized as infringing on the labor rights of legislative assistants, as well as bringing public censure on their work.
What proves notable, however, is that such backlash against the bill does not cleave along partisan lines. Reportedly, a number of KMT legislative assistants have also expressed anger against the bill, with the suggestion that it is a disgrace to their profession.