TAIPEI (Taiwan News) -- Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) legislators Liu Shih-fang (劉世芳), Chiu Chih-wei (邱志偉), Hsu Chih-chieh (許智傑) held a public hearing on Friday on making English Taiwan's second official language.

On April 28, the legislators convened a hearing titled "The Promotion of English as the Second Official Language," in the Legislative Yuan, which called for funding from the Cabinet's "Forward-looking infrastructure Development Plan" to achieve the goal.

Liu pointed out that having strong English language skills are important for national competitiveness, and currently Taiwanese people's English language ability is ranked only 33rd in the world. Excluding New Zealand and Australia, of the "New Southbound Policy" nations, Taiwan ranks 9th, meaning that after 40 years of trying to teach English in Taiwan, there is still a long way to go, said Liu.

As a member of the Board of Education, Hsu said that though he had studied English for 20 years, he had not reached a high level of proficiency and does not dare speak English when traveling abroad. He noticed in his travels to Southeast Asian countries that they place great importance to English education.

Hsu said when his daughter went to study abroad in Melbourne, Australia, she felt her English skills were inadequate. He said the way Taiwan's education system spoon-feeds English to students does not create the kind of environment in which English becomes a part of daily life.

Chiu said he would request the Ministry of Education and the National Development Council implement programs under the NT$880 billion (US$28.86 billion) "Forward-looking Infrastructure Development Plan" to teach foreign languages in the public education system and create friendly environments to promote the use of English at city and county levels.

Tai Chin-mi, from the Humanities Publishing Division of the Ministry of Culture, said many ethnic groups in Taiwan are facing a crisis with the survival of their cultures, even local Taiwanese dialect may be lost within 30 years. So she said he hopes that through the "National Language Development Law" the Ministry of Culture can protect endangered Taiwanese language groups.

When the National Language Development Law was discussed last year, English was not listed as a language that needed to be protected, said Tai. She emphasized that it should be instead treated as a separate issue.

Chiu, countered that the National Language Development Law was meant to preserve the diversity of languages and to establish the sustainable development of languages, but that it does not apply to English. He suggested that the government could best promote English by increasing educational resources and not through legislation.