Taiwan's Legislative Yuan has cut more than NT$1.3 billion from the Ministry of Culture's budget, prompting a war of words between Culture Minister Lee Yuan and Kuomintang legislator Weng Hsiao-ling — bad news for the arts and cultural sector.

• The Legislative Yuan passed next year's overall budget on its third reading, slashing more than NT$1.3 billion from the Ministry of Culture's original NT$29.2 billion, leaving about NT$28 billion.
• At the heart of the dispute is the NT$47.38 million in media publicity funding, which was cut entirely. Lee Yuan condemned this as "retaliatory and humiliating" reckless cutting, saying it reflects the KMT and TPP's disregard for culture.
• Weng Hsiao-ling shot back that if Lee Yuan feels NT$28 billion is too little to get things done, he should leave sooner rather than later.
• The Ministry of Culture said the media publicity funding is the "last mile" in taking Taiwanese culture to the world — initiatives such as the culture voucher and cracking down on scalpers, for example, require diverse marketing to reach millions of users.

Outlook: With the two sides deeply at odds, the Ministry of Culture worries that this complete cut will become a pretext for long-term reductions in media publicity funding in the future. The tug-of-war over cultural policy among the KMT, DPP and TPP shows no sign of ending soon.