News
Government budget stalled
A legislative review of the 2025 central government budget remains stalled after opposition lawmakers demanded the Cabinet revise its spending plan. The vote on the motion was proposed by KMT lawmakers and nine of the 17 lawmakers in attendance supported it, effectively stopping any further reviews of the budget outside of the Procedure Committee.
DPP lawmaker Shen Fa-hui is describing the move as "unprecedented" arguing that the main task of the new legislative session is to review and pass the budget bill.
However, KMT lawmaker Chen Yu-ren was quick to point out that President Lai Ching-te and Premier Cho Jung-tai employed the same procedural tactic in the DPP's failed move to hold up the central government budget bill when they were lawmakers in 2008.
The vote comes after the lawmakers from the KMT and Taiwan People's Party sent the budget bill back to the Procedure Committee during last Friday's legislative session. Both parties demanded the Cabinet submit a revised budget bill that addresses an expected rise in compensation due to the amended Logging Ban Compensation for Lands Reserved for Indigenous Peoples Act as well as legislative resolutions, such as hiking the price for government acquisition of public food stocks.
The 2025 budget bill has to be approved by the legislature one month before the new fiscal year begins on New Year's Day. However, the 2022 and 2023 budgets were both passed in January.
