Taipei City Councilor Huang Yufen has just given birth and is still in confinement, trying to participate in the city council's budget review meeting through video conference.

(Picture taken from Huang Yufen Facebook)

[Instant News/Comprehensive Report] Taipei City Councilor Huang Yufen was still in confinement after giving birth to his son "Lewis" on the 14th. "Epidemic" video conference, she "is not a confirmed person", so she can't video conference, and there are netizens on PTT who said "I'm too embarrassed to ask for maternity leave even though I have money from the public."

Legislator Lai Pinyu expressed her solidarity with Huang Yufen in a Facebook post today (21st), calling on the Ministry of the Interior to solve this problem as soon as possible and implement parental equality.

Huang Yufen's Facebook post on the 19th:

Huang Yufen posted on her Facebook fan page on the 19th that she had just finished giving birth, and she was still not allowed to attend parliament meetings. The letter only mentioned "due to the epidemic" of the video conference meeting, but did not mention "due to postpartum and other physical conditions", so the city council could not allow her to hold the video conference.

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Huang Yufen said that she can understand that the Taipei City Council does not dare to make decisions and arrangements on its own without a clear ruling from the central competent authority.

However, after this story was reposted on the PTT forum, some netizens questioned in a sour voice, "You have to take care of your work while confinement, it's simply a reversal of women's rights", "Then don't give birth, you can take maternity leave even if you have money from the public", etc. language.

Huang Yufen emphasized that what she wants to fight for is the "right to choose" whether the mother can work or not, not to force the mother to work. One of the reasons why so many women don't have children".

Huang Yufen's Facebook post on the 20th:

Lai Pinyu expressed her solidarity with Huang Yufen in her Facebook fan post this evening, and pointed out that the dispute came from the Ministry of the Interior's response to Taichung City Council's reply in 2020 to ask "whether video conferences can be used during the epidemic". The Taipei City Council used this letter to explain To respond to the "physical needs of fertility" is actually quite off topic.

However, Lai Pinyu also said that she can understand that grassroots units are accustomed to citing letters from central units when there is no precedent, and she did not want to review the responsibilities of a single agency.

Lai Pinyu called on the Ministry of the Interior to not hand over the responsibility to the local council. It should make a clear statement on the case as soon as possible, and conduct a comprehensive review of matters involving women's political participation rights at all levels of government agencies to implement parental equality.

Lai Pinyu posted on Facebook on the 21st:

Huang Yufen gave birth to her son "Lewis" on the 14th.

(Excerpted from Huang Yufen's Facebook fan page)