John Dingell

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, is it the practice of the Chair, then, or would it be the practice of the Chair to inform us of whether the Clerk's certification is 100 percent correct when that process has been completed?

Mr. DINGELL. I thank the Speaker. I may have further parliamentary inquiries, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 5 minutes. (Mr. DINGELL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Norwood), my good friend and a man of remarkable courage and integrity.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Texas (Mr. Green).

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry).

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from North Dakota (Mr. Pomeroy).

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis). (Mr. DAVIS of Illinois asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, we have heard it already. This access package is going to cost $156,000 for a well-to-do patient. It is not going to give anything to the poor. The reason for that is that this is a tax deduction. The poor do not pay taxes. So who is going to get, then, the money that is going to come under this proposal? Only the well-to-do. What will be the practical effect on the insurance pool? To suck out the well-to-do out of the conventional insurance pool and to set up a very special, privileged insurance pool for the well-to-do. That is what this legislation does. In addition to that, the legislation expands SMAs. This is another proposal which benefits the well-to-do, because they do not care whether they have to buy the insurance or not, what they want to do is to get the tax deduction and tax break which benefits only those of substantial means. The other thing that it does, it misdirects Federal tax dollars to tax deductions that help the wealthy. This is hardly a defensible expansion. Remember, we are paying $156,000 per new insurance beneficiary. The whole of this program is going to cost $31.2 billion. Guess from what part of the government accounting structure it is coming. It is coming from the social security deficit, which is now a reality at this particular time. I think it is time we recognize that what we are here for is to craft good legislation. This is not. If Members want to craft good legislation in the field of covering new people, then the minority stands ready to help our Republican colleagues towards that end. This bill does not do that. We came here to talk about the Patients' Bill of Rights, about protecting the rights of patients, not in obfuscating the issue by bringing forward a lot of phony tax breaks and a lot of help to fatten the rich at the expense of the poor. What we need here is attention to the real problem. Then if they want to go on in a carefully packaged and carefully programmed set of rules, regulations, and laws which will address the problems of people in terms of providing uniform coverage for all Americans, I stand ready to do it. I remind my Republican colleagues that it was they who killed, together with the assistance of their same good friends in the insurance lobby, the President's last proposal to expand health care to all Americans. It looks like they are up to the same game today.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 3 minutes. (Mr. DINGELL asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, this is an old story. Last year, the industry spent $75 million to defeat legislation similar to that which we are considering today. Reports today indicate they will be spending in excess of $100 million for that purpose. Tonight they will be launching another new ad campaign with pictures of sharks and music from Jaws. What scared them so much? Could it be they are afraid of paying for someone's cancer screening? Are they terrified of paying for surgery to some person who needs it? Is it the threat of paying for prescription drugs that has them petrified? Or maybe they are afraid of letting ordinary people make the decisions that affect their own lives. Maybe they are afraid of the mother whose child has leukemia and wants the pediatrician to decide what care her child needs or perhaps a terminally ill cancer patient who has no other treatment available to save his life, other than a clinical trial. Perhaps that patient needs to have an oncologist as his principal medical advisor. Maybe it is a woman in her second trimester of pregnancy whose doctor is dropped from the health care plan, or maybe it is a woman with breast cancer who has a mastectomy and is sent home that same day, or the man with a stroke who needs follow-up visits to a physical and speech therapist to regain full function. The Norwood-Dingell bill would help each of these people get and continue the health care they need. None of the other substitutes can truthfully make that claim. The gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Norwood) and the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Ganske) and I have been working on these issues for years. Our bill has been totally vetted. We have even incorporated suggestions from other Members, including the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Coburn) and the gentleman from New York (Mr. Houghton). We are going to hear a lot of rhetoric about lawsuits, and it is one thing which is perhaps one of the significant differences between these bills. Yes, we allow patients to hold their health care plans accountable if they cause harm or death when they make a medical decision. That should be. A right without a remedy is of no value. All we have done is the same thing they did in Texas, where a law enacted during the tenure of Governor George Bush does these things. In 2 years since that law has been in effect, Texas has had exactly 5 lawsuits. The cost of such a situation, according to Coopers & Lybrand, a major accounting firm, amounts to 13 cents a month. Let me remind all here, only one of these bills that is considered today was written before yesterday. They are all brand new, except the one which is offered by the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Coburn), the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Ganske) and I. All of our bills have been examined in broad daylight. The others have not. There is only one bipartisan bill. There is only one that has a chance of being signed into law. Only one has been endorsed by more than 300 organizations, including doctors, teachers, consumers, union members, specialists, women and others, including the league of voters, and all of the consumer organizations. Only one has a chance of really making life better for people who buy health insurance and only one gives the people a clear right to the care which they need and which they deserve. Only one will be signed by the President. Vote for Norwood-Dingell and support a bill that is going to benefit the people. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that I may yield 15 minutes of the time available to me to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Norwood), to be controlled by him.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Capps).

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I first want to say that I have worked in this place for a long time, and I have worked with a lot of people. None have been more steadfast, courageous, harder working, more able or more dedicated on the matters upon which we work, and I want to commend the gentleman from Georgia and thank him. I want to make the observation that I hope my colleagues will have listened to the gentleman from Georgia, because what he is talking about is people who are desperately in need of the protection he and I seek to provide. I want to point out that what he is seeking to do here is to assure that employers who do not intrude into the every day management of the particular fund that is set up for the health care and for the procurement of health care are absolutely protected against liability. The gentleman is totally correct in that. And the only time that an employer would incur a liability under this legislation is if he had actively intervened against the beneficiary. And so I want to first commend the gentleman. Second of all, I want to urge my colleagues to listen to him. He has been speaking great wisdom. He has also been speaking of justice and decency and something that the health care industry has not always been providing to the recipients of health care. It is an extremely important point in this legislation. Honest and decent employers have nothing to fear, and HMOs which have been denying people the health care to which they are entitled under the contract do have something to fear. And, indeed, they should. They are the folks that I happen to be after.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the legislation offered by my good friend and colleague from Flint, Michigan. As the Michigan Delegation's representative to the House Resources Committee, Dale Kildee has been done a superb job as our advocate for better parks and recreational opportunities, while serving as a seasoned voice for strong natural resources policies. It should be no surprise, then, that the House is today considering my colleague's bipartisan bill to establish the Saint Helena Island National Scenic Area in Lake Michigan. The need is simple: to preserve and protect a place along the Great Lakes' shores where all Americans can appreciate primitive recreation opportunities, fish and wildlife habitat, vegetation, and the historic and cultural resources of a small but unique island near the Straits of Mackinac. The people of Michigan value greatly the natural heritage and rugged beauty of our Great Lakes shoreline, particularly in this quiet, peaceful part of what we affectionately refer to in my District up ``Up North.'' The acquisition has the support of the current landowners and local government, and the U.S. Forest Service has indicated it is prepared to manage the new Scenic Area once it is acquired. I have no doubt that Saint Helena is a wise investment by the Federal government for the preservation of a very special place, and the recreational enjoyment of this and future generations of Michiganders. It is my hope that H.R. 468 will move swiftly to the President's desk, and that sufficient Land and Water Conservation funding will be found in the near future to secure this national treasure between our two peninsulas.

Mr. DINGELL

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, the motion to recommit is very simple. We have heard a lot of red herrings about how this is going to jeopardize the legislation. It is not. The chairman and members of the Committee on Armed Services could convene a conference, and we could have this matter back on the floor by early next week. That is not going to delay anybody getting a pay raise or anything else. What Members are going to do if they vote for the motion to recommit is to arrange a situation where we will clarify the Secretary's authority to oversee the new agency. The Secretary will be able to deal with both the questions of health, safety, environment, environmental protection and also to deal with the questions of secrecy. That is what we really want. What the motion to recommit does is to return us to a situation where we are very close to the bipartisan agreement that was expressed in the Senate legislation. If you want a quick way to resolve this problem, let us do that, because the Senate will accept this in the snap of a finger or the beat of a heart. I would urge my colleagues to move in the direction of seeing to it that the Congress can control the behavior of DOE, the behavior of the secrecy mavens down there in that agency and to see to it that we have openness which prevails with regard to environmental safety, health, worker safety and questions of that kind and to see to it at the same time that we preserve and protect security. This legislation as it is now constituted does nothing, nothing, to assure additional secrecy. As a matter of fact, it returns us to those curious days when the AEC leaked like a sieve and when there were major problems in terms of the Congress knowing what was going on down there. Vote for the motion to recommit. It is good legislation, it is careful attention to process, and it will leave the public better.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, with all respect for the chairman of the committee and all respect for my good friend, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton), I have been advised that the gentleman from Missouri supports the bill. I therefore ask, Mr. Speaker, is the gentleman from Missouri opposed to the bill, and therefore, is he entitled to time in opposition to the legislation?

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to recommit.

Mr. DINGELL. Absolutely.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Sawyer). (Mr. SAWYER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Udall). (Mr. UDALL of New Mexico asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)