Press Conference to Announce the Results of the Evaluation of the Sixth Session of the Tenth Legislative Yuan

CCW’s evaluation of the sixth session of the tenth Legislative Yuan has yielded 21 outstanding legislators! Four legislators were selected as requiring extra supervision, meaning their performance in this round of evaluation was subpar.

The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has a total of 13 outstanding legislators; the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) has a total of 3; the New Power Party (NPP) has 3; and 2 outstanding legislators are independent. Out of the 4 legislators deemed as requiring extra supervision, 1 is from the DPP; 2 are from the KMT; and 1 is independent.

CCW President Jian-Yuan Tseng stated: “Citizen Congress Watch continues to care about the performance of legislators. According to the data, the performance of legislators in the tenth Legislative Yuan has been overall better than that of legislators in the seventh, eighth, and ninth meetings, meaning that legislators have successfully transformed from being ‘part-time legislators’ into being ‘full-time legislators.’ However, it is also possible that the results from this evaluation were influenced by pressure coming from last year’s election, as the number of legislators who require extra supervision has reached a new high this year. During CCW’s evaluation period, the legislators must undergo several months of consideration; the process is quite rigorous. The electorate can see from the evaluation results which legislators had a good performance and thus should be considered favorable candidates for following elections. The performance of legislators from both the TPP and the NPP was on average exceptional and worthy of recognition.”

CCW’s evaluation has 24 total items that can further split into 51 specific indexes, making it the most comprehensive, longest-lasting, and most credible evaluation of legislators in all of Taiwan. The evaluation is split into two phases: the preliminary and second-round evaluations. The preliminary evaluation comprises five groups: basic performance and citizen evaluation; behavior and language and lawsuits; bill proposals; budgetary bills; and evaluation of the president, vice president, and party whips. On April 9, CCW hosted the second-round evaluation meeting, where, using the results from the preliminary evaluation, this session’s outstanding legislators (from the 8 standing committees and party whips) and legislators requiring extra supervision were decided upon. The evaluation primarily uses public materials from the legislature to review and calculate a score based on the legislators’ absence rate, interpellations, bills and/or budgetary bills, and the performance of proposals to reasonably cut or freeze the budget. CCW also adds and deducts points and conducts a qualitative review based off of qualitative materials such as videos of citizen evaluators questioning legislators; the legislators’ disclosure status; special deeds and whether the legislator has proposed bills or budget-related measures that either (1) comply with the public welfare or (2) infringe upon human rights or the general public interest; and inappropriate language or behavior.

CCW Vice President James Kan stated: “Qualitative review indicators include whether the bill has a political version; whether the legislator held a public forum when proposing the bill; and whether the legislator was present for the review of any bills or budgetary measures. In addition to the evaluations of each group of legislators, there are also more than a thousand more scores given/put forth after citizens from all over the country watch videos of legislator interpellations, and these are also considerably representative of legislator performance. After the press conference, we plan to host an award ceremony on Friday, April 14, and before 6:00PM that day all of the evaluation materials will be published on the CCW website. We encourage all citizens, media, and legislators to join us in examining these materials.”