Public needs to keep up pressure on governments

Public needs to keep up pressure on governments 

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2014/09/22/2003600279 
By Wang Chung-ming 王鐘銘
Translated by Julian Clegg

The Executive Yuan is adjusting its national regional plan and the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) is working on amendments to the Enforcement Rules for the Regional Plan Act (區域計畫法施行細則).

The authorities have made several attempts to consult with civic groups to reduce conflicts, but these matters have run up against the same problem: While the central government wants to devolve some of its powers and responsibilities to local governments, the local authorities do not enjoy people’s trust.

The Ministry of the Interior wants counties and municipalities to operate their own regional planning committees, and the EPA wants them to do a proper job of conducting environmental impact assessments. Environmental groups are worried that development projects will not be examined properly and that they will get pushed through due to vested interests.

Two examples, one positive and one negative, can show why such worries exist.

The controversy over environmental impact assessments for the Miramar Resort on the Taitung County coast has dragged on for 10 years with no resolution because the Taitung County Government’s assessments have not been done in accordance with the law. To begin with, the county government helped the resort’s developers evade an assessment. However, eventually, an assessment became unavoidable. Since then, there have been seven assessments, but none has been conducted legitimately.

The other example is that of the expansion of the Hsinchu Science Park using land in Miaoli County’s Houlong Township (後龍), which was rejected by the ministry’s Construction and Planning Agency in the face of protests by Wanbao Borough (灣寶) farmers. This is a rare example of a successful campaign against land expropriation.

Another reason for this success was that the department in charge of examining the expansion plan was the ministry’s Regional Planning Commission. If the Miaoli County Government comes to have a regional planning commission of its own, it is doubtful whether fertile farmland like that of Wanbao will continue to be preserved.

Part of the reason why the ministry and the EPA want to hand over some of their powers and responsibilities is that they often face protests and even administrative lawsuits, yet instead of tackling the underlying problems, they prefer to skirt around them. Civic groups are obviously not willing to let them get away with that.

At the same time, civic groups must admit that we cannot go on forever expecting the central government to be the arbiter of justice, sending its agents to receive local residents’ petitions and handle disputes.

There are two key reasons why people do not trust local governments. The first is a lack of information transparency and public participation in all kinds of procedures, and the second is the lack of effective checks and balances in interactions between executive and legislative departments, which results in a monolithic approach to policy decisions. The former reason represents a lack of participatory democracy, while the latter results from neglect of duty in a representative democracy.

Both these problems require the public to keep challenging the government to reform the system, to educate executive departments so that they will come to carry out procedures more smoothly.

Nationwide local elections will be held on Nov. 29. Are the above-mentioned expectations being raised as an electoral issue? Does sufficient pressure exist to make these changes happen? If these concerns are still not raised, the ministry and the EPA will have to go on acting as the last lines of defense.

Poll finds 82 percent think housing prices too high

Poll finds 82 percent think housing prices too high
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2014/06/10/2003592423

Staff writer, with CNA

A housing policy survey recently conducted by the Want Want China Times Poll Center among adults in Taipei, New Taipei City, Greater Taichung and Greater Kaohsiung showed that 82 percent of the respondents think housing prices are unreasonable in comparison with their incomes.

Among the age groups polled, 30-to-39-year-olds were found to be the most dissatisfied with housing prices, with 91 percent complaining that prices are unreasonably high.

Despite the discontent expressed, 69.4 percent of those surveyed listed owning a home as one of their goals in life.

However, 63.6 percent said they could never afford to buy one in an urban area, according to the survey, which collected 2,447 valid samples from telephone interviews which took place between May 12 and May 14.

“Using a real-estate purchase as the core financial management strategy for life will cause significant damage to the nation and society,” said Hua Ching-chun (花敬群), an associate professor at Takming University of Science and Technology.

A good housing policy should make helping the socially disadvantaged the top priority, Hua added, suggesting that the government provide sufficient social housing and take measures to solidify the rental market.

An article published by the Chinese-language China Times yesterday concerning equality in Taiwan featured the failure of the 1990-2014 Danhai New Town (淡海新市鎮) development project in New Taipei City’s Tamsui (淡水) along the northern coast of Taiwan.

The project was aimed at “building housing units for mid and low-income households,” and “resolving the housing problem in the Greater Taipei area,” while “suppressing land prices,” in response to protests about a lack of affordable housing in metropolitan areas and rising house prices.

Danhai New Town was designed to accommodate 300,000 people on 1,756 hectares. However in the past 25 years, the town has had an occupancy rate of less than 10 percent.

Pointing to a group of more than 600 public housing units situated further along the coast, Danhai New Town resident Lu Cheng-chung (盧正忠) said that basically, the project was a failure.

“Those in the middle and lower income brackets cannot afford to commute [between the remote town and the city in which they work], Tamsui resident Wang Chung-ming (王鐘銘) said.

Also, no manufacturing industries want to move to the coast, while many local light industry businesses have been forced to move out due to the government’s land requisition policies and restrictions that prevent industries from expanding, he added.

Urban Reform Promotion Organization secretary-general Peng Yang-kae (彭揚凱) said the government’s housing policy is either encouraging people to buy homes or build cheap public housing.

However, history shows “no one wants to live in a remote area,” Peng said.

As for public housing built in urban areas, he pointed out, the quantity is too small to suppress rising housing prices. The chance of finding this kind of affordable accommodation through the drawing of lots is the same as winning the lottery, Peng said.

Government 'misleading' public over nuclear policy

Government 'misleading' public over nuclear policy
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2014/05/08/2003589843

By Tang Chia-ling and Lo Chien-yi  /  Staff reporters

Taiwan Power Co’s (Taipower) application to the Atomic Energy Council to extend the lifespan of the Jinshan Nuclear Power Plant shows that President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) promise not to extend the life of the three operating nuclear power plants is just another broken promise, a lawmaker and antinuclear activists said yesterday.

The criticism came as Minister of Economic Affairs Chang Chia-juch (張家祝) and a section head from the council’s Nuclear Regulation Department, Chang Shin (張欣), appeared before the legislature’s Economics Committee yesterday.

Chang Shin told lawmakers that Taipower has approached the council about its application to extend the life of the Jinshan Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Shihmen District (石門) and was asked to submit additional data.

Asked if such a review went against Ma’s promise not to extend the lifespan of the three operating plants, Chang Shin said: “Energy policies are made by energy-related agencies, and the Atomic Energy Council is in charge of monitoring nuclear safety. Taipower postponed its operation extension application [made in 2009] on its own, so it has the right to resume it.”

During a press conference on energy policy on Nov. 3, 2011, Ma said that Taiwan would steadily move toward the goal of reducing nuclear power and would not extend the lifespan of the three operating nuclear plants.

Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Cheng Li-chun (鄭麗君) said that as the Jinshan plant’s spent fuel pool is almost at full capacity, extending its lifespan would be neglecting the life and property of the more than 7 million people who live in the Greater Taipei area.

Cheng said the Executive Yuan has previously claimed that several countries have found final repositories for their high-level radioactive wastes, including spent nuclear fuel, but very few countries have finalized their decisions.

Even if they have finalized their decisions, it would be impossible for them to accept Taiwan’s spent nuclear fuel, she said.

Only Sweden and Finland are still planning to establish nuclear waste final repositories, but Finland’s laws stipulate that “nuclear wastes that are not domestically produced shall not be handled, stored or permanently disposed of in Finland,” she said.

There is not a township in Taiwan that is willing to accept nuclear waste and the government is lying to the public with its claims of “international cooperation” and “treatment across national boundaries,” she said.

Taipower chief nuclear energy engineer Chai Fu-feng (蔡富豐) said that although Finland’s final repository for high-level radioactive wastes in Olkiluoto Island, Eurajoki cannot accept Taiwan’s raw spent nuclear fuel, there are still many possibilities for Taiwan’s high-level radioactive waste treatment after processing in the future.

The International Atomic Energy Agency encourages international cooperation in dealing with nuclear waste, although no specific plan has been reached, he said.

Meanwhile, Green Citizen Action Alliance deputy secretary-general Hung Shen-han (洪申翰) said trying to extend the lifespan of the three plants “is the Ma government’s expression of pro-nuclear power and a completely regressive step.”

Wang Chung-ming (王鐘銘), of the Northern Coast Anti-Nuclear Action Alliance, said the government is trying to use the extension of the three plants’ to hide that it lacks the ability to decommission the plants or deal with nuclear waste.

Antinuclear action to continue: groups

Antinuclear action to continue: groups
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2014/05/01/2003589310/1

NO MORE TALKS:An antinuclear protest group member said the groups would not continue talks begun last year with the Executive Yuan because of a lack of progress

By Lee I-chia  /  Staff reporter

Antinuclear groups said yesterday the platform for communicating with the Executive Yuan — established last year for discussing the treatment of nuclear waste — is a failed mechanism and that they would no longer attend meetings because the government has no intention or ability to deal with the issue.

More than a dozen people from the groups made the announcement yesterday afternoon in front of the Executive Yuan’s front gate, which was fenced with barbed wire barricades and protected by a line of police holding shields and batons.

The groups came to an agreement with Premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) in April last year to form a communication platform to discuss issues concerning the treatment of nuclear waste.

After Jiang on Monday morning announced a halt to construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Gongliao District (貢寮), Minister of Economic Affairs Chang Chia-juch (張家祝) said on the same day that a postponement to the retirement of the three operating nuclear power plants would be discussed.

Northern Coast Anti-Nuclear Action Alliance executive committee member Wang Chung-ming (王鐘銘) said the groups would stop communicating with the government through the mechanism because the government has made no progress over the past year.

He said they had urged for low-level radioactive waste to be removed from the storage facility in Lanyu (蘭嶼) as its lease had expired, civic participation in deciding on locations for spent nuclear fuel dry cask storage facilities, no extension on the lifespan of currently operating nuclear power plants and no construction of a nuclear waste depository in eastern Taiwan, where less electricity is used.

“[The Executive Yuan] is incapable of dealing with nuclear waste, stalling and not doing anything,” the groups chanted outside the Executive Yuan.

Tao Foundation (蘭嶼部落文化基金會) secretary-general Sinan Mavivo said: “I have been dumb enough to believe the government when it promised to move the waste away ... but our hope has turned into despair.”

“We’re fed up,” Green Citizen Action Alliance deputy secretary-general Hung Shen-han (洪申翰) said. “After one year, the government still has no plan to meet our demands, and even said it needs more time to study the issue, but local residents just want to feel safe when they sleep.”

“If the government is incapable of solving the nuclear waste problems, then why extend the lifespan of nuclear power plants and create more nuclear waste?” Hung asked.

Northern Coast Anti-Nuclear Action Alliance chief executive Kuo Ching-lin (郭慶霖) said: “When we use nuclear fuel rods for five years, the toxic danger threatens future generations for hundreds of thousands of years, so why does anyone want to use nuclear power?”

He said that since he was a child, the plants have been constructed, and for the past few decades, the groups have been trying different ways to convince the government of the danger.

Nuclear policy is being controlled by certain groups who benefit from it, “but the government never listens to us,” Kuo said.

Dumping envelopes filled with documents from various meetings with government agencies from his bag, Kuo said people have called him irrational for participating in antinuclear social movements, such as occupying Zhongxiao W Road on Sunday.

“It is because efforts made through the legal system and during countless meetings were all neglected,” he said.

“A few days ago, my daughter said she has not eaten a meal cooked by me for a long time,” Kuo said, adding that its not that they like being busy and protesting all the time, but they are fighting for the safety of the public against the government, which is forcing legislators to back up its policies.

He said the government is creating division and hatred among people by stigmatizing antinuclear protesters by calling them “hijackers.”

The groups said they will continue to fight against nuclear power at the local level in various ways in their hometowns.

Groups urge public to abolish nuclear power this year

Groups urge public to abolish nuclear power this year
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2014/02/24/2003584215

By Lee I-chia / Staff reporter / Taipei Times Staff reporters

This year will be the most crucial year in the fight to abolish nuclear power in Taiwan, anti-nuclear groups said at a forum in Taipei yesterday, citing reasons that included the possible insertion of fuel rods in the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Gongliao District (貢寮).

“Other reasons are that since the [three] active nuclear plants are fast approaching their planned retirement dates and the government is always stalling on its promises to decommission the plants, the problem of nuclear waste treatment could become a tipping point this year,” Wang Chung-ming (王鐘銘), a member of the Northern Coast Anti-Nuclear Action Alliance’s executive committee, told the forum hosted by the National Nuclear Abolition Action Platform.

Wang said activists fear the government may try to extend the active plants’ operational life span.

He said that Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) has already extended the original capacity of the spent fuel pools at the three active plants by increasing storage density. The capacity of the pool at the Jinshan Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Shihmen District (石門) was extended from 3,030 bundles to 5,514, while the Guosheng Nuclear Power Plant in New Taipei City’s Wanli District (萬里) had its 5,040-bundle capacity pool raised to 7,544 and the pool at the Ma-anshan Nuclear Power Plant in Pingtung County’s Ma-anshan (馬鞍山) went from handling 1,492 bundles to 2,328.

On Saturday, Taipower announced that the spent fuel pool at the Jinshan Nuclear Power Plant will meet its storage capacity at the end of the year, so it urgently needs the government to approve its plan to build a dry-storage facility.

However, Wang said that Taipower is merely trying to force the government and the public to approve the dry-storage facility.

He added that dry cask storage of spent fuel is not only controversial, because the feasibility of taking spent fuel rods from the pools are a safety concern, but also that it is doubtful that the proposed facility — which is meant to be used for mid-term storage — will not eventually be made into a final disposal site, given that Taipower has broken its promises many times in the past.

“Taipower bounced its checks on removing low-level radioactive waste from Lanyu (蘭嶼), which was originally planned for 2002, then extended to 2016 and last year once again pushed back to 2021,” Wang said. “If Taipower cannot deal with low-level radioactive waste disposal, how can we trust it to properly deal with spent nuclear fuel?”

Green Citizens’ Action Alliance director-general Lai Wei-chieh (賴偉傑) said it is frustrating to see how the government “threatens the public and shirks its responsibility” to continue using nuclear power, rather than developing alternative energy policies.

Lai said anti-nuclear groups are worried that fuel rods will be inserted at the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant as part of test runs during the safety inspections currently being conducted by the Atomic Energy Council that Taipower has said will be completed by June.

Moreover, even though the council has not approved Taipower’s ultimate response measures, the company and President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) have already promised the public that a nuclear disaster can be prevented in the event of an emergency situation, Lai said.

“The government should devise institutional electricity-saving measures, such as dispersing electricity demand during peak hours, or improving power usage effectiveness, rather than morally pressuring the public to save electricity,” he said.

The groups urged the public to attend a parade set for March 8 to promote the “total abolition of nuclear power, face the problems of nuclear waste, terminate the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant and created a nuclear-free homeland.”

Anti-nuclear alliance planning mass demonstrations around Taiwan on March 8 (FTV’s English news)

Anti-nuclear alliance planning mass demonstrations around Taiwan on March 8 
2014/02/23
(FTV’s English news)

An anti-nuclear alliance vowed a nationwide protest on March 8. to express opposition to nuclear power. The alliance is worried a safety report concerning the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant will be sent to the Atomic Energy Council for review in June. Thus paving the way for the plant to begin tests and operations as early as September.

Last year’s March 9, anti-nuclear rally continues to be a fresh memory in the minds of many people. And now, nearly a year later, many are concerned about a possible power plant security report for the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant to be submitted at the end of June which has led many anti-nuclear groups to be unhappy.

Wang Chung-ming
North Coast Anti-Nuclear Action Alliance
Why do I believe that this year is the key? This is because if we have no way to force the government to develop a suitable policy to deal with nuclear waste, they could simply extend current operations, and delay the decommissioning of (plants) by a few years.

Many are also worried that the fourth nuclear power plant could begin initial testing in September at the earliest. Anti-nuclear groups have yet to achieve any consensus with government officials about nuclear waste, with lack of agreements regarding Lanyu’s nuclear waste issues, as well as decommissioning old nuclear power plants, and a general lack of specific planning. All of these concerns are leading to general dissatisfaction, with anti-nuclear activists now planning to take to the streets on March 8. Upwards of a hundred anti-nuclear activist groups will take to the streets in protest.

Hung Shen-han
Green Citizens' Action Alliance
This year's protest will be similar to those last year, taking place in Taipei, Taichung, Kaohsiung, and Taitung. There will be parades to warn the government not to act like there are delays though continue construction with the attitude that it will succeed (in operating the plant).

Many environmental groups around Taiwan will join together on March 8 to express their joint opposition to nuclear power.

Premier pledges to act on environment

Premier pledges to act on environment http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2013/11/30/2003578004 
By Shih Hsiu-chuan and Lee I-chia / Taipei Times Staff reporters

A much-talked-about documentary depicting how the nation’s environment has been ravaged prompted Premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) to demand that Cabinet officials “take an iron fist” to environmental problems, Executive Yuan Deputy Secretary-General Chien Tai-lang (簡太郎) said yesterday.

Chien told a press conference following an intergovernmental meeting that Jiang has ordered Cabinet members to carry through “forcefully” policies that have become necessary because environmental preservation is a task that “allows for no delay.”

The Cabinet yesterday held the first meeting of an ad hoc task force led by Chien and attended by vice heads of related government branches.

Jiang ordered the establishment of the task force after he attended a screening of the film Beyond Beauty: Taiwan From Above (看見台灣) by Chi Po-lin (齊柏林) that documents Taiwan by using aerial photography.

Government agencies were divided into five teams to work on 16 major national conservation issues exposed by the documentary and will present an initial report to Jiang in one month, Chien said.

Among the issues were illegal mining of gravel and sand, sediments in water reservoirs, land subsidence induced by pumping excessive underground water, excessive hillside development and river pollution, he said.

The task force categorized the 16 issues into four topics — mining of sand and gravel, management of coasts and hillsides, environmental quality and development in sensitive areas — with government branches related to each of the topics being assembled in a group to work on the issues, Chien said.

The Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of the Interior were in the fifth group, charged with ensuring necessary enforcement measures take place to crack down on illegal activities that damage the environment, he added.

The task force will meet every two weeks to draft short, medium and long-term solutions to environmental problems, Chien said.

“We will take a holistic approach and not just focus on the 16 problems,” he added.

Earlier yesterday about a dozen representatives from environmental groups protested outside the Executive Yuan and accused the government of continuing environmental destruction.

The film shows how state land is being excessively developed, and the damage caused by illegal gravel mining or inappropriate land use, but the Cabinet is still trying to amend laws that would loosen restrictions on development in reservoir water catchment areas, the protesters said.

Taiwan Environmental Protection Union founding chairman Shih Hsin-min (施信民) said that if the government really watches the film and “sees Taiwan” (the literal translation of the film’s Chinese name), it would cancel the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant, retire nuclear plants currently in operation, stop destroying high-quality farmland and stop any development in water catchment areas, among other measures.

Wang Chung-ming (王鐘銘), spokesman for a self-help group against land expropriation for the Danhai New Town phase-two project, said the vacancy rate is already very high in the new town’s phase-one area, yet the government still wants to develop the 1,168-hectare second-phase area that will include 871 hectares of farmland or forest land, “which will destroy natural ecology and human rights.”