Ed Markey

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) for his responses. Mr. Speaker, I note the gentleman from Illinois who is here and he deserves special praise for his work on child safety seats.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I was listening to this discussion, and it occurred to me that if we just go back over the last 6 years, that is from the moment of which the Republican party took over the United States Congress, there has not been a discussion about what more can be done for the environment. The real issue was how can we do less? I mean, their goal was to turn EPA from standing for the Environmental Protection Agency into Ever Polluters Ally. I mean they wanted to change Superfund so we played the polluters, rather than the polluters playing the American people for spoiling our natural resources. And now as we hit this campaign year, the year 2000, GOP it used to stand for Grand Old Party; but now it stands for the Gas and Oil Party. They do not propose to first ensure that we have more efficient society, that we bring out the waste that exists within the United States and the world in terms of our consumption of oil. Their first idea is let us go to the most pristine part of the entire country, the Arctic natural refuge area and to begin drilling, even though they still have not even begun to tap all the rest of Alaska in terms of its oil production capacity. It is a ruse, in other words. They take every crisis not as an opportunity to explain to America how we can use these natural resources more efficiently, but rather how can we now take the most precious part of the natural resources we have in the country, in the Arctic, in these refuge areas, and begin drilling there as well? They say, well, all we will leave is human footprints there. I do not know why these environmentalists are concerned. But the truth is that they have left a footprint over in Prudhoe Bay, and it is a human footprint indeed; but it is an industrial footprint of despoliation of the environment in that area. There has been no real protection given to the environment. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer) for bringing this issue up at this point, because I think it is central to the consideration of the American people, in terms of which direction they want our country to go in at this central point in our country's history. I think last night we learned that the first thing the oil industry wants to do is go to the Arctic and to take this precious land and to begin the same process that they have already undertaken in Prudoe Bay, and I think that would be a historic mistake.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Madam Speaker, I want to start off by thanking Mrs. Cubin, Mr. Gordon, Chairman Tauzin, Mr. Dingell, and Chairman Bliley for being responsive to many of the concerns that have been raised about the underlying bill. The bill being offered today contains many helpful clarifications and changes embodied in it that were in response to concerns I have raised about the measure. I believe that in its current form it will clarify the ability of the Commission to protect consumers and safeguard competitive gains in many of its provisions. I would like to focus my remarks on a couple of areas that I suggest need additional refinement and that I hope can be dealt with prior to sending this bill to the President. The first has to do with the pricing flexibility and pricing deregulation provision of the bill. The substitute will continue to allow pricing deregulation upon the advent of facilities-based competition in a given service area. The facilities-based competitor however is only required to have at least one--I repeat, one sole customer. Hopefully they will have more but the point is that competition may arrive, but may not be robust or effective in constraining prices. This concern, I suggest, is heightened in those areas where a company may still be subject to rate-of-return regulation rather than price cap regulation. Regardless of what level of competition triggers pricing flexibility we must be cognizant of the serious repercussions that may result in situations where a carrier remains rate of return regulated. In other words, consumers in those areas that are not subject to effective competition and receive service from a rate-of-return company run the risk of price increases. There's no guarantee that prices may go up but there is certainly a risk. The FCC testimony with respect to this legislation highlighted this risk. The FCC testimony the Telecommunications Subcommittee was given is as follows: [A] grant of pricing flexibility to rate-of-return carriers without the implementation of protections comparable to those adopted by the FCC with regard to price cap carriers could be particularly problematic. Rate-of-return regulation would allow such carriers to raise rates on other customers sufficiently to maintain the authorized level of return while they lower prices for contract customers. This pricing deregulation is not going to affect directly any consumer in my congressional district, but I would suggest to the rural members of the House that they may want to take another look at this pricing deregulation and refine it further because I believe--and the FCC clearly believes--that it runs the risk of allowing unnecessary and unjustified price hikes. The second issue I want to highlight is the merger review section. This section states that any review involving a so-called 2 percent carrier must be approved or denied by the condition within 60 days. I understand that the companies do not want merger reviews to drag on for years, but I would suggest that 60 days is too short and unrealistic. While I believe the Commission is itself streamlining its process, if the majority is insistent on having a merger review ``shot clock'' I would suggest giving the Commission a greater period of time. In addition, at our merger review hearing Commissioner Powell made what I thought was a reasonable suggestion. He noted that often companies will amend their initial applications, often late in a review and after public comment. He suggested some flexibility for the FCC to extend the review. I would suggest, therefore, something that would allow a one-time extension if a majority of the Commission voted to extend the review-- of if the filing company itself requested an extension. I think this is a more reasonable way to proceed because in my view 60 days is frankly too short a time and does not sufficiently protect the public interest. I hope we can continue our dialogue about these issues and others and make additional changes as we proceed on this bill in the future. Thank you.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to me. Mr. Speaker, this is a very important debate. I think it is important for everyone who is listening to the debate to understand what we are debating and what we are not debating. We are debating a privacy commission. In fact, that is how it is described by the proponents. But for those that want real privacy, we are debating a privacy omission. That is what this debate is really all about. We have bills before Congress. They have been sitting there for years. The gentleman was the chair of this subcommittee and did not have any hearings on the subject. The Committee on Banking and Financial Services, no hearings; the Committee on Commerce, no hearings. Everyone understands what the problem is. The Internet industry understands, the banking industry understands, the health industry understands the issues. What frightens them most greatly is that the public understands them, as well. These are not complicated issues. We over the years have made many decisions with regard to the privacy of the American public. It is not something that requires a lot of study. We make it a requirement that a driver of an automobile have to opt in before any license information, driver's license information, can be transferred. If we rent a video cassette at a video rental store, they have to get our permission before they transfer that information. If we are watching cable TV and late at night we might flick over to one of those pay per view channels that maybe we don't want the rest of the family, much less everyone else in the neighborhood, understanding that we might have watched, the cable industry cannot tell anyone that we did that. They have to get our permission before they do so. If we call anyone on our phones, the phone company cannot tell anybody who we called without our permission. If a child goes online to a commercial site for children and they are under the age of 13, that site cannot transfer that information to anyone else without the express permission of parents. But if the child is 13, if the child is 14, if the child is 15, there are no restrictions. Do Members think this Congress could figure out that maybe we should protect 13- and 14- and 15-year-olds? We are told by the committee that they cannot figure that out. It is too hard for them to know whether or not a 13-year-old or a 14-year-old or a 15-year-old's information should be transferred. They need to get an expert panel of industry officials, primarily, I am going to bet that is the case, to tell us whether or not those children should be protected. Mr. Speaker, that is why we run for office. People in this country know whether or not they want their health care records protected or not. They know whether or not they want their financial records protected. We do not need a Commission to study this. This is not beyond the ability of this Congress to deal with. What the bill is really all about is punting for another 2 years, 18 months, for the commission to study it. It means it is right before the next Congress ends, in the year 2002, which is exactly what the industry wants. We do not have to be a genius to figure out what to do to protect children, to protect the medical record of Americans, to make sure that somebody cannot take all of our checks or all of our brokerage accounts, all of the medical exams we might have to take for an insurance policy, and then sell it as though it is a product. Do we really have to study that? I don't think so. This is just a commission to make sure that this Congress can say that it did something; that is, put a fig leaf over this issue. So Mr. Speaker, yes, we need a new economy, but we need a new economy with old values. We need commerce with a conscience. This Congress, by passing this bill, demonstrates that it is unwilling to grasp this moral issue of what corporate America is doing in taking the private, most sensitive information of American families and turning it into a product which is sold around the country and around the world. So if Members want privacy and they want it to happen, vote no on this bill and force them to bring out the bills over this next week that ensure that on the Internet, on financial records, on the health care data of every American family, we give them the protections which they deserve. Otherwise, this bill is going to guarantee that there will be no action in the next Congress either, because the report does not come back until 2 years from now, at the end of the next Congress. So I think that, while they may have had all the hearings on their commission bill, that, without question, whether or not we are going to ensure that the new technology ennobles and enables Americans rather than degrades and debases, whether or not we come to grips with the fact that there is a sinister side of cyberspace and that we understand it and that we demonstrate to the American people that we do understand it, and that we become the privacy keepers as were our local bankers when we were younger, our doctors and nurses when we were younger, and that we identify with those privacy keepers rather than the privacy peepers and the information reapers which these new data banks are able to make possible, creating products out of the family information of each one of us in the United States. I do not believe that there is an issue more central to the integrity and the well-being of a family in the United States than whether or not we give them the rights today to protect that information from being turned into a product. To say that we do not have the ability to understand it says that we do not understand cyberspace, we do not understand the world in which everyone is living, and we do not understand that 85 percent of the American public in every single poll are demanding us to give them the right to protect this information. Vote no on this commission.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from California for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, let me give my colleagues an illustration of the problem that we have right now. The gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Leach), Republican, passed a bill earlier out of his committee that would have given additional opt-in protections for medical information. It passed out of the Committee on Banking and Financial Services 26 to 14. That was back on June 29 of this year. The bill has not been heard from since. It just sits over there with the leadership on the Republican side holding onto this bill even though, on a bipartisan basis, Democrats and Republicans have already come to an agreement that the financial records that include sensitive medical information should be protected with this extra level of an opt-in protection. In addition, I mean, we can go down the litany, the gentleman from California already went down earlier the litany of bills which have been introduced in this Congress which are still awaiting hearings, still awaiting deliberation. But it is hard for Members of Congress to reach that bipartisan consensus if no hearings are being held by the Republican leadership on these very sensitive subjects. And to basically subcontract out our responsibility to a commission when the American public expects us to be making those decisions ourselves, and we have the capacity to do so, while we feign ignorance, we are basically saying there is an invincible ignorance on our part, when we cannot understand these issues, when in fact the reality is that, when we act on these issues, when we move, the Republican leadership then blocks them from coming out here on the floor because the industries that are affected do not want the American people to have any additional privacy. That is the core issue that we are talking about here, whether or not we are going to take on those large industries who basically have a commercial stake in compromising the privacy of every single American. At this point in time, if we look down the litany of bills that have been before the Congress over the past year, we can say that, without question, that there can only be a zero which is given to the Republican leadership in dealing with this issue of American privacy.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I was given an ironclad commitment by the other side when we were debating the financial services bill last November that they would have hearings all this year in the Committee on Banking and Financial Services on financial services and health care privacy. They had no hearings on this issue. That side over there did not, in fact, fulfill its commitment.

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

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join with the gentleman from California (Mr. Cunningham) and a bipartisan coalition of other Members in introducing the ``Energy Efficient Buildings Incentives Act''. Energy use in buildings in this country accounts for approximately 35% of polluting air emissions nationwide--about twice as much as the pollution from cars. It costs the average American $1500 to heat and cool their homes every year, which amounts to an annual cost of $150 billion nationwide. Commercial buildings and schools incur $100 billion in annual utility bills. And yet, the tax code fails to provide sufficient incentives to reduce wasteful and unnecessary energy use. This is bad policy, and it must be changed. In these times of ``brown outs'' and ``black outs'' in communities across this nation and in times of rising fuel prices, we should be looking for ways to ensure that energy is never wasted. That is why we have introduced the ``Energy Efficient Buildings Incentives Act.'' Our bill would spur use of energy efficient technologies, such as super-efficient air conditioning units, which could result in a substantial drop in peak electricity demand of at least 20,000 megawatts--the equivalent of the output of 40 large power plants. At a time when many communities are currently facing electricity supply shortages, and the local political issues involved with siting and building new power plants are difficult and contentious, our bill provides tax incentives for: Efficient residential buildings, saving 30% or 50% of energy cost to the homeowner compared to national model codes, with a higher incentive for the higher savings. Efficient heating, cooling, and water heating equipment that reduces consumer energy costs, and, for air conditioners, reduces peak electric power demand, by about 20% (lower incentives) and 30%-50% (higher incentives) compared to national standards. New and existing commercial buildings with 50% reductions in energy costs to the owner or tenant, and Solar hot water and photovoltaic systems. If only 50% of new buildings reach the energy efficiency goals of this legislation, air pollution emissions in this country could be reduced by over 3% in the next decade, and decrease even more dramatically over time. In that same ten-year period, this legislation could result in direct economic savings of $40 billion to consumers and businesses. For example, a family that installs an energy efficient water heater can get $250 to $500 back from the tax code changes and an additional $50 to $200 every year in reduced utility bills. Or a family that purchases a new home that meets the standards in this bill can get as much as $2,000 returned to them by the tax incentives, in addition to the $300 or more in continuing energy savings. I urge other Members to join us in saving American consumers money, improving the air we breathe and the water we drink, increasing the competitiveness of American industries, and eliminating inefficiencies in the tax code by encouraging energy efficiency in our schools and our commercial and residential buildings.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman very much for yielding me this time. Mr. Speaker, I rise because of my great concern that within this bill is the reauthorization for the Energy Policy and Conservation Act. But missing from it is the language which would authorize the President to deploy the Strategic Petroleum Reserve or to create a regional home heating oil reserve on a permanent basis. When this bill left the House, it was in. As it comes back from the Senate, it is gone. Now, I know that there are some people, George Bush, who is saying it is 45 days before the election. I understand his perspective. But for those of us in the Northeast and the Midwest, we have a different perspective. We think it is 45 days before winter. We think the President should have the authority to create a regional home heating oil reserve on a permanent basis, to have a trigger in it that is a definition that he can use to deploy it, that is flexible so that we can deal with the fact that two-thirds of all the home heating oil in the world is really consumed in the northeastern part of the United States, and that ultimately there can be this depressing impact upon the price of crude oil. Since last Wednesday when this discussion began in the Clinton-Gore administration, the price of oil has dropped $6 a barrel, from $38 down to $32, which is good for the consumers. Now, yesterday the chairman of the energy subcommittee, the Republican chairman, said that he was going to introduce a bill that prohibited the President from using the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. He said he did not think it was an emergency. Of course, down in Texas, they have another phrase for this kind of a situation. They call it a profit-taking opportunity, and it is for the oil companies. They are tipping people upside down and shaking money out of their pockets. This bill should contain the authorization for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and for the regional home heating oil reserve which is so critical for the Northeast and Midwestern part of the country. Now, people say that we should not use it. Nero fiddled while Rome burned. They could have sent over some firehoses to kind of do something about it, but he just decided to fiddle away, and Rome was lost. Noah could have listened to the fish, not built an ark. The fish say, no problem. The higher the water gets, the better it is for us. Kind of like the oil companies. You do not need this ark of a Strategic Petroleum Reserve for everybody else, for the human beings. They can just pay higher prices. So this bill is severely deficient, lacking the authority to protect American consumers from these skyrocketing outrageous energy prices. As a result, this bill should be rejected.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, this week I introduced the Home Health Care Protection Act of 2000, H.R. 5303, the companion bill to the Senate version introduced by Senator Jeffords. This bill will clarify the definition of ``homebound'' and improve the lives of millions of Americans who are confined to the home as well as their caregivers. In my own family, my mother who was afflicted with Alzheimer's Disease was confined to the home for over eight years. My father was her caregiver. I was awed by his utter devotion and dedication to her care, day in and day out. Taking care of an Alzheimer's patient is grueling. It's a 24 hour a day job, 7 days a week. For many caregivers the only break in attending to the needs of the Alzheimer's patient is through adult day care services. Adult day care not only provides therapy for the Alzheimer's patient but a desperately needed break for the caregiver. But, Mr. Speaker, the unfortunate truth is that Medicare beneficiaries are unable to attend adult day care without losing their home health benefits because of a narrow interpretation of the Medicare law. Alzheimer's patients may not attend adult day care without losing their home health benefits even though we know that adult day care services are a complement to home health benefits, relieve caregiver burdens and delay nursing home placement--all at zero cost to the Medicare program. However, yesterday in the Commerce Committee we took a step toward correcting this situation--a victory was won for Alzheimer's patients and their caregivers. The BBA give-back package which was passed out of Committee unanimously by voice vote included language clarifying the ``homebound'' definition in the law allowing for Medicare beneficiaries with Alzheimer's disease who are confined to the home to attend adult day care services without losing their home health benefits. While we took a step in addressing this important issue with respect to Alzheimer's patient's broader language to encompass ALL beneficiaries who are confined to the home was not included by the Chairman's mark. Furthermore, this language will not allow any beneficiaries who are confined to the home to attend religious services, or to take a slow, arduous walk around the block, or to attend once in a lifetime events like a granddaughter's graduation, or a grandson's wedding. Mr. Speaker, this isn't right. However, H.R. 5303, The Home Health Care Protection Act of 2000, is designed to correct this flaw. H.R. 5303, is the companion bill to the Senate version introduced by Senator Jeffords. It further clarifies the ``homebound'' definition to allow for those who have had the misfortune of an illness which confines them to the home, to attend a graduation, to go to their place of worship and to attend adult day care services. It's time we clarify the definition of ``homebound'' in the Medicare law. Homebound beneficiaries should be free to leave the home under special circumstances without fear of losing their home health benefits. It's only right, Mr. Speaker. Americans who are confined to their homes deserve better. We can and should do more for them. Making the Home Health Care Protection Act of 2000 the law of the land will do just that.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Ehlers) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) from Michigan have spent a considerable amount of time dealing with an issue which I think should be of great concern to everyone because of the increase in its occurrence as a phenomenon. We have millions of CB operators across the country. They have a lot of fun with it, and they do not really cause anybody any problems at all. They are kind of like the original Internet, in a lot of ways. They are out there with their own separate sets of networks on which they are able to communicate, and it is really a great thing for our country. But there has been a rising incidence of individuals using CB frequencies abusively. They actually build towers in their neighborhoods, and they start broadcasting over the CB frequency. It has several severe adverse consequences for all of the rest of the people who live in the neighborhood. It has the effect of interfering with television broadcast reception. It has the impact of interfering with telephone reception. It has the impact of interfering with every electronic piece of equipment in the home. Moreover, it has even more consequences. That is, the content of many of these CB frequency broadcasters is profane, and it interferes with the ability of families to be able to live in peace and quiet without having someone in the neighborhood broadcasting in a way that actually goes into the homes of others who live in that community. The Federal Communications Commission does not have the resources to be able to deal with this essentially local phenomenon, this set of brush fires that are cropping up increasingly across the country in community after community. What this legislation does is to give to the States the ability to move in and to enforce the laws which ensure that these neighborhood nightmares, these nuisances are shut down, and that those individuals use the CB frequency in the same way that the millions of others in America who use the CB frequency use it, that is, for their own enjoyment and not in a way which creates a nuisance for everyone else in their community. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Ehlers) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell), in my opinion, have done an excellent job on this legislation. I thank the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Burr) for bringing it out to the floor at this time. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I do not have any other requests to speak at this time; and with the request to all Members to support this good piece of legislation, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join my colleagues on the Commerce Committee in introducing the Beneficiary Improvement and Protection Act of 2000. 1 want to commend Chairmen Bliley and Bilirakis, as well as Ranking Democratic Members Dingell and Brown for putting together a Commerce Committee initiative to repair some of the damage wrought by the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. 1 commend them because Members of the Commerce Committee were shut out of this process last year and the year before while our Medicare and Medicaid providers were hemorrhaging and Medicare beneficiaries across the country were suffering. The legislation we are introducing today addresses some of the most critical problems with the Balanced Budget Act, but this $21 billion package, like last year's $16 billion package, is woefully inadequate. I want to thank Chairman Bliley and Rep. Dingell for working with me to include a provision of great importance to me, a clarification of the homebound definition for the purpose of permitting people afflicted with Alzheimer's Disease to leave the home in order to receive adult day care. This is an important amendment that will make a real difference in the lives of Alzheimer's patients and their family caregivers. However, we need to do even more to help all people who are homebound. It's not only homebound Alzheimer's patients in need of adult day care. In addition, I believe all Medicare beneficiaries who are classified as homebound should be able to get out of their homes to attend religious services or once-in-a-lifetime events like the wedding of a granddaughter or the graduation of a grandson. Mr. Speaker, three years ago, Congress passed the so-called ``Balanced Budget Act'' claiming it would cut $115 billion from Medicare and $12 billion from Medicaid. Mr. Speaker, that $115 billion figure has become the Energizer Bunny of Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates, it keeps growing and growing and growing. CBOs most recent estimate from July 2000 shows that Medicare cuts now total $230 billion. Medicare spending increased by just 1.5% in FY98, it actually went down 1% in FY99, and it remained flat in FY2000, increasing by just 1.5% And by some mystery Mr. Speaker, just as the amount cut from the Medicare program keeps growing, so too does the Budget surplus. The people in my district have watched in horror as local institutions-- community hospitals and home health agencies--have closed their doors for good--a scene I'm sure has played out in many congressional district around the country. Hospitals in Massachusetts will lose $1.7 billion because of the BBA. My hometown hospital, the Malden Hospital is now an outpatient surgical center, a far cry from the fall-service hospital of my youth. The nearby Boston Regional Medical Center in Stoneham has closed. The Symmes Hospital in Arlington is closing. Others in my district are on life support. Home health agencies throughout my state have been decimated and devastated. Nursing homes are hurting as well. Mr. Speaker, in this era of unprecedented surplus, we should be restoring $40-50 billion over the next five years and $80-100 billion over the next ten to the Medicare and Medicaid programs. It would be a refund of the amount we overcharged seniors in the BBA. Congress put a $115 billion price tag on BBA, but when seniors came to the register, they were charged over $200 billion -- and we owe them a refund. I don't think that's too much to ask for our seniors, for the men and women who built this country. The surplus we enjoy today has been generated in large part by these Medicare cuts that have harmed seniors. I believe we should give this senior surplus back to the seniors, back to the programs that pay for their health care. I am pleased that the Commerce Committee has produced a bill that deals with some of the most critical aspects of the BBA cuts. However, I am hopeful that as we move forward in the few remaining weeks of this session, that we will increase the price tag for this giveback package--$21 billion is not going to get the job done.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join with my friend and colleague, the Gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. Frank, the entire Massachusetts delegation in the House, and many of my other colleagues in the House in introducing the ``Medicare, Medicaid, SCHIP Balanced Budget Refinement Act of 2000.'' Mr. Speaker, in this era of unprecedented surplus, we must ask the question, ``Who's surplus is it?'' The answer is, ``it's the seniors' surplus.'' The legislation we are introducing today is closely modeled after legislation (S. 3077) recently introduced in the Senate, and will provide $40 to $50 billion over five years in additional Medicare and Medicaid payments to health care providers adversely affected by the cuts in the 1997 law, including hospitals, home health agencies, managed care plans, and nursing homes. In 1997, seniors in our country were told that the price tag for Balanced Budget Act was going to be $115 billion. Even then, the Gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank) and I thought that price was too high, and that was one of the principal reasons we voted against the bill. But today, we find ourselves in a situation where the actual cost of the BBA is turning out to be over $200 billion. In addition to the cost of the BBA doubling, Medicare spending is down sharply, increasing by just 1.5 percent in FY98, decreasing by 1.0 percent in FY99, and increasing just 1.5 percent in FY2000--well below the predicted growth rates for the program. Mr. Speaker, we owe our seniors a refund. That's not too much to ask for the men and women who built this country. The 1997 Medicare cuts have harmed seniors, and I believe we should give this senior surplus back to the seniors to pay for their health care programs. Congress is working on a package of Medicare givebacks this year to deal with the most critical aspects of the BBA cuts, a package that will cost about $21 billion. However, I am hopeful that as we move forward in the few remaining weeks of this session, that we will increase the price tag for this package. $21 billion is not going to be enough to get the job done. Mr. Speaker, the following is a summary of the legislation, outlining specific areas of relief, such as community and teaching hospitals, skilled nursing facilities, home health care facilities, and Medicare HMOs, which I submit into the Record. The Medicare, Medicaid and SCHIP Balanced Budget Refinement Act of 2000 We believe strong that Congress, in light of the projected budget surplus for the next five years, should provide substantial relief to health care providers hurt by the 1997 Balanced Budget Act. Today, we are introducing the House companion bill to S. 3077, the Balanced Budget Refinement Act of 2000. The following is a summary of the key provisions of the legislation: Hospitals: Significant portions of the BBA spending reductions have impacted hospitals. According to the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC), ``Hospitals' financial status deteriorated significantly in 1998 and 1999,'' the years following enactment of BBA. BBRA-2000 would address the most pressing problems facing hospitals by: Fully restoring, for fiscal years '01 and '02, inpatient market basket payments to keep up with increases in hospital costs, an improvement that will help all hospitals. Preventing implementation of further reductions in (IME) payment rates for vital teaching hospitals--which are on the cutting edge of medical research and provide essential care to a large proportion of indigent patients. Support for medical training and research at independent children's hospitals is also included in the Democratic proposal. Targeting additional relief to rural hospitals (Critical Access Hospitals, Medicare Dependent Hospitals, and Sole Community Hospitals) and making it easier for them to qualify for disproportionate share payments under Medicare. Providing additional support for hospitals with a disproportionate share of indigent patients, including elimination of scheduled reductions in Medicare and Medicaid disproportionate share (DSH) payments, and extending Medicaid to legal immigrant children and pregnant women, as well as providing State Children's health Insurance Program (SCHIP) coverage to these children. Establishing a grant program to assist hospitals in their transition to a more data intensive care-delivery model. Providing Puerto Rico hospitals with a more favorable payment rate (specifically, the inpatient operating blend rate) as MedPAC data suggests is warranted. Home Health. The BBA hit home health agencies particularly hard. Home health spending dropped 45 percent between 1997 and 1999, while the number of home health agencies declined by more than 2000 over that period. MedPAC has cautioned against implementing next year the scheduled 15 percent reduction in payments. BBRA-2000 would: Repeal the scheduled 15 percent cut in the home health payments, remove medical supplies in the home health prospective payment system (PPS), provide a 10-percent upward adjustment in rural home health payments to address the special needs of rural home health agencies in the transition to PPS. Security costs for high crime areas are also covered in this legislation. Provides $500 million to care for ``outlier'', or the sickest and most costly, patients. Clarifies the ``homebound'' definition allowing Medicare beneficiaries to attend adult day care, religious services or important family events while continuing to receive home health benefits. Allows home health agencies to list telemedical services on their cost reports and orders HCFA to study whether these services should be reimbursable under Medicare. Provide full update payments (inflation) for medical equipment, oxygen, and other suppliers. Skilled Nursing Facilities (SNFs). The BBA was expected to reduce payments to skilled nursing facilities by about $9.5 billion. The actual reduction in payments to SNFs over the period is estimated to be significantly larger. BBRA-2000 would: Allow nursing home payments to keep up with increases in costs through a full market basket update for SNFs for FY 2001 and FY 2002, and market basket plus two percent for additional payments. Further delay caps on the amount of physical/speech therapy and occupational therapy a patient can receive while the Secretary completes a scheduled study on this issue. Rural. Rural providers typically serve a larger proportion of Medicare beneficiaries and are more adversely affected by reductions in Medicare payments. In addition to the rural relief measures noted above (under ``hospitals''), BBRA-2000 addresses the unique situation faced in rural areas through a number of measures, including: a permanent ``hold-harmless'' exemption for small rural hospitals from the Medicare Outpatient PPS; assistance for rural home health agencies; a capital loan fund to improve infrastructure of small rural facilities; assistance to develop technology related to new prospective Hospice. Payments to hospices have not kept up with the cost of providing care because of the cost of prescription drugs, the therapies now in end-of-life care, as well as decreasing lengths of stay. Hospice base rates have not been increased since 1989. BBRA-2000 would provide significant additional funding for hospice services to account for their increasing costs, including full market basket updates for fiscal years '01 and '02 and a 10-percent upward adjustment in the underlying hospice rates. Medicare+Choice. This legislation would ensure that appropriate payments are made to Medicare+Choice (M+C) plans. Expenditures by Medicare for its fee-for-service providers included in BBRA-2000 indirectly benefit M+C plans to a significant extent. Moreover, the legislation includes an increase in the M+C growth percentage for fiscal years '01 and '02, permitting plans to move to the 50:50 blended payment one year earlier, and allowing plans which have decided to withdraw to reconsider by November 2000. Physicians. Congress understands the pressures that physicians face to deliver high-quality care while still complying with payment and other regulatory obligations. BBRA-2000 provides for comprehensive studies of issues important to physicians, including: the practice expense component of the Resource-Based Relative Value Scale (RBRVS) physician payment system, post-payment audits, and regulatory burdens. BBRA-2000 would provide relief to physicians in training, whose debt can often be crushing, by lowering the threshold for loan deferment from $72,000 to $48,000. Beneficiary Improvements. House Democrats continue to believe that passage of a universal, affordable, voluntary, and meaningful Medicare prescription drug benefit is the highest priority for beneficiaries. In addition, BBRA-2000 would directly assist beneficiaries in the following ways: Coinsurance: BBRA-2000 would lower beneficiary coinsurance to achieve a true 20 percent beneficiary copayment for all hospital outpatient services within 20 years. Preventive Benefits: The bill would provide for significant advances in preventive medicine for Medicare beneficiaries, including waiver of deductibles and cost-sharing, glaucoma screening, counseling for smoking cessation, and nutrition therapy. Immunosuppressive Drugs: The bill would remove current restrictions on payment for immunosuppressive drugs for organ transplant patients. ALS: The bill would waive the 24-month waiting period for Medicare disability coverage for individuals diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). M+C Transition: For beneficiaries who have lost Medicare+Choice plans in their area, BBRA-2000 includes provisions that would strengthen fee-for-service Medicare and assist beneficiaries in the period immediately following loss of service. Return-to-home: The bill would allow beneficiaries to return to the same nursing home or other appropriate site-of- care after a hospital stay. Part B penalty: The bill would limit the penalty for late enrollment in Medicare Part B. Vision Services: The bill would allow beneficiaries to access vision rehabilitation services provided by Orientation and Mobility Specialists, Low Vision Therapists, and Rehabilitation Teachers. Other Provisions. BBRA-2000 would address other high priority issues, including: improved payment for dialysis in fee-for-service and M+C to assure access to quality care for end stage renal disease (ESRD) patients; increased market basket updates for ambulance providers in fiscal years '01 and '02; an immediate opt-in to the new ambulance fee schedule for affected providers; and enhanced training opportunities for geriatricians and clinical psychologists. BBRA-2000 also The Act in addition includes important modifications to the Community Nursing Organization (CNO) demonstration project, and additional funding for the Ricky Ray Hemophilia program. Medicaid and SCHIP. The growing number of uninsured individuals and declining enrollment in the Medicaid program are issues that also must be addressed. To improve access to health care for the uninsured and ensure that services available through the Medicaid and SCHIP programs are reaching those eligible for assistance, BBRA-2000 includes the following provisions: Improve eligibility and enrollment processes in SCHIP and Medicaid. Extend and improve the Transitional Medical Assistance program for people who leave welfare for work. Improve access to Medicare cost-sharing assistance for low- income beneficiaries. Give states grants to develop home and community based services for beneficiaries who would otherwise be in nursing homes. Create a new prospective payment system (PPS) for Community Health Centers to ensure they remain a strong, viable component of our health care safety net. Extend Medicaid coverage of breast and cervical cancer treatment to women diagnosed through the federally-funded early detection program. Permit nurse practitioners and clinical nurse specialists to bill independently under State Medicaid plans, regardless of whether or not a physician or other health care provider is supervising.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I want to begin by complimenting the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Frelinghuysen). He did good work here. In our committee process, we were able to take his legislation, fine tune it a little bit, and to ultimately bring it out here to the floor of the House for action by every Member. Consumers who want to exercise their right to be placed on a do-not- call list or to take a telemarketer to small claims court after being called are often frustrated when they cannot get the Caller ID information from the telemarketer to identify them. This legislation addresses whether telemarketers may actively block Caller ID information, and contains a prohibition against anyone making a telephone solicitation who interferes with or circumvents the capability of Caller ID services to work with consumers. An amendment was made in the Committee on Commerce. The gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Burr) and I and other members of the committee worked to construct an amendment to make clear that telemarketers will not be forced to buy all new equipment, and that the use of equipment that is incapable of transmitting Caller ID information is not in and of itself a violation. In my view, however, telemarketers who solicit the public in their homes for commercial gain should not be permitted to evade the purpose and functionality of Caller ID services. This bill will prevent telemarketers from doing so, while further empowering consumers to control the communications going to and from their home. Mr. Speaker, the bottom line is that the telecommunications revolution gives enormous opportunities for telemarketers, but it also gives to consumers powers, and those powers should include the ability, using Caller ID, to prevent information from going to their family which they believe is inappropriate. I think that this balances something which is very much consistent with the nonpartisan, non- ideological way in which we have been constructing telecommunications policy over the last generation in Congress. I again congratulate the gentleman from New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, again I echo what the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Frelinghuysen) just said. I urge all Members of the House to support this good legislation.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time. General Leave

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, first of all, there have been a lot of hearings on Superfund; there have been a lot of hearings on a lot of issues. We admit that. There just have not been any hearings on this bill. Nobody has any idea what is in this bill. This is a little process put together, a secret process. We were not told that there were going to be meetings. We had no ideas which rooms to go to. So the Democrats were not allowed in the room. So it is their own bill. There were no hearings on it. They do not want to have this bill to have to withstand the scrutiny of public examination, so they just bring it in here today and they say they support taking care of small businesses. Well, we all support taking care of small businesses, we do. That is not the debate here. The real issue is, by reforming Superfund, by passing this bill, it is a lot like losing weight by swallowing a tapeworm. Yeah, you will get the desired results, but you are going to have a host of additional problems as well. My colleagues are not willing to let everybody here talk about it in public. Let me go down a few of the things that are wrong with it in our cursory examination of it. The idea is to get these small companies out of the cleanup process who have only contributed a small amount of toxic waste, but the problem with the bill is, they put the burden on the States and on the Federal Government. They do not have the records. The little companies do. The little companies should come in with the records to get themselves out of trouble; otherwise we are not going to know if some of these little companies did some bad things, but at least they should have the responsibility of bringing all of the information in. As well it is going to spawn more litigation, rather than less, because it reopens already decided administrative hearings. By the way, my colleagues have done an amazing job. My colleagues have the EPA and the environmental groups and the Business Roundtable all opposed to it. That is an impossible triple. That is the 1-7-10 split in bowling. My colleagues cannot get the Business Roundtable and the environmentalists opposed to a bill; it is impossible. What my colleagues have done is created a toxic combination of bad policy and bad procedures which contaminate the House procedures, the whole House, because Democrats are not allowed in the room. Mr. Speaker, the only way to clean up the mess is to defeat the bill out here on the House floor this evening.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the Child Support Distribution Act (H.R. 4678) which will allow more child support money to get to the families who need and deserve this compensation. I would like to commend Chairwoman Nancy Johnson for sponsoring this legislation and for working tirelessly on behalf of the families of America who will benefit from this bill. I would also like to thank Mrs. Johnson for working with me and my colleagues to make improvements to this legislation as it moved through Committee. On June 26, I along with my colleague Representative Joe Barton submitted a letter to Mrs. Johnson asking that Title III of H.R. 4678 be deleted due to the serious privacy threat the language posed to highly sensitive and personal information. Under Title III, private child support collection agencies would be granted access to national data bases established in 1996 exclusively to facilitate securing delinquent child support payments by federally funded state child support collection agencies. These databases house personal financial, wage and health information. Under current law, state child support agencies and their contractors are subject to federal regulation with respect to the use and disclosure of this sensitive information. However, under Title III of the bill, private collection agencies would have been allowed to access this same information with no federal protections whatsoever. In addition we submitted a letter to Secretary Shalala at the Department of Health and Human Services asking her to urge the President to veto any legislation that would allow unregulated access to access to these databases. We were not the only ones disturbed by the language in Title III, consumer privacy groups, state organizations, and employer groups as well as child advocacy groups were all in strong opposition to the title. These groups included the Children's Defense Fund, the National Women's Law Center, the Center for Law and Social Policy, the Association for Children for Enforcement of Support, Inc., the Consumer Federation of America, Consumers Union, U.S. Public Interest Research Group, and the American Payroll Association. These groups understood that allowing unfettered access to these databases could ultimately undermine child support enforcement efforts. In compelling testimony regarding the privacy threat associated with expanding access to these databases, Joan Entmacher, Director of the National Women's Law Center stated the following on May 18 before the Human Resources Subcommittee on Ways and Means: Over the years, Congress has worked to increase the effectiveness of child support enforcement while protecting the privacy of individuals. In the Family Support Act of 1988 and Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, Congress required the creation of the automated systems and databases essential to effective state child support enforcement, and addressed legitimate privacy concerns by carefully limiting access to and use of the information. If access to these databases is expanded, and abuses occur, a future Congress or state legislatures may conclude that the only way to protect privacy would be to dismantle these databases altogether, permanently setting back child support enforcement. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased that Chairwoman Johnson was receptive to our concerns and elected to preserve privacy by removing Title III from the bill. Again, I commend my esteemed colleague Representative Johnson for her leadership on this matter.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, on July 27 I along with 21 bipartisan Members introduced the Homebound Clarification Act of 2000, H.R. 5067 the companion bill to the Senate bill sponsored by Senator James Jeffords (R-VT) and Senator Jack Reed (D-RI). This bill solves a problem in the current Medicare Home Health benefit that has created serious problems for Alzheimer's patients and our most frail, elderly and vulnerable Medicare beneficiaries. Under current law, in order for Medicare beneficiaries to receive coverage for home health services they must be ``confined to home''. Current policy interpretations by the Health Care Financing Administration and followed by fiscal intermediaries are causing substantial harm to Medicare beneficiaries by effectively forcing home health users to be unnecessarily restricted to their own homes. These restrictions impose harsh and irrational restrictions on patients and their caregivers. For instance, Alzheimer's patients are denied access to adult day services, which complement home health benefits, relieve caregiver burdens and delay nursing home placement, at no cost to the Medicare program. In another instance, home health services to a quadriplegic beneficiary who is lifted into a wheelchair and uses specially adapted transportation and is therefore not considered to be homebound. The introduction of the Homebound Clarification Act follows the introduction of similar legislation Representative Chris Smith and I introduced in March of 2000, H.R. 4028. This bill was a more narrowly crafted version of the Homebound Clarification Act bill and targets patients with Alzheimer's Disease and related dementia disorders only. The Homebound Clarification Act is endorsed by over 40 health and advocacy groups. This bipartisan legislation will help to improve the lives of millions of our most frail and vulnerable Americans. I look forward to continuing to work with my colleagues to pass this important measure.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Chairman, a few summers ago a boondoggle was born: the Nuclear Energy Research Initiative--NERI. When I think of this program, I can't help but think ``There's something about NERI. Just like the movie from which it was inspired, this program is a bad spoof--it passes itself off as a necessary research initiative to maintain the viability of the nuclear power industry. But it is really nothing more than the same subsidy for the nuclear power industry that Congress cut in 1998. It is amazing that such a mature, established industry still has a subsidy from the federal government. In the last few years, the nuclear power industry has been a $140 billion dollar a year industry. In fact, the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), the industry trade group for the revenue were nuclear utilities. That hardly sounds like a fledgling industry in need of government subsidy. But that is exactly what the industry would have you think. They will tell you we need this money to conduct research into new reactor designs. The problem is this research helps the industry improve the economic performance of existing facilities. I don't think an industry that already produces 20% of the nation's electricity needs any more help from the federal government to improve the performance of its facilities. The industry has the resources and expertise to deal with those issues on its own. Before you think this is important academic research let me remind you that NERI awarded grants to Westinghouse and General Electric to develop new advanced reactor designs. These are companies that have been designing and building equipment for the nuclear industry for over 40 years. They should know by now how to develop new generations of reactors. More importantly, they have the resources to carry out that research. Mr. Chairman, this industry has received $47 billion dollars in subsidy over the last fifty years. That's close to $1 billion dollars a year! Imagine what wind, solar or other clean renewable energy projects could do in fifty years if they received subsidies of $1 billion per year. The time to be subsidizing this industry is over. The nuclear energy film is on the last reel and it is time to begin making room for the digital age of electricity generation--multiple, reliable, clean renewable energy generating sources integrated into a seamless transmission network. So with the funds available from NERI, we will take $6 million form the NERI program and put it into research into the reliability of the electricity transmission system. Brownouts and blackouts are looming this summer. This research will help keep the lights on and the air conditioners running. In addition, the research will examine how to ensure that the clean, renewable distributed generating facilities can be integrated into the transmission infrastructure. In addition, we will increase wind power research and development by $13 million to bring it closer to the Administration request level. This is a true, clear renewable energy source. With the research the Department of Energy is conducting, the industry will ensure wind energy a viable alternative to other forms of electricity generation. We have decided to make regarding the future of our electricity generating facilities. I encourage members to put a stop to subsidies for mature industries. Instead give the new industries a chance to research their potential to deliver clean, renewable energy for the future. I urge members to vote yes on the Foley Amendment.

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Chairman, I support the Sherwood-Markey-Barton amendment to reauthorize the Energy Policy and Conservation Act and establish a Northeast Home Heating Oil Reserve. On April 12th of this year, the House approved the Energy Policy and Conservation Act reauthorization by an overwhelming vote of 416 to 8. This bill included language that I authored to provide for the establishment of a heating oil reserve in the Northeast. What we did on that legislation was to work out an agreement with the Chairman of the Energy and Power Subcommittee (Mr. Barton) that constructed a kind of a classic Austin-Boston piece of legislation. The gentleman from Texas was concerned about the fate of certain marginal oil producers that operate so-called stripper wells. He noted that during the 1998-1999 price drop, these domestic producers had the proper set of incentives in order to continue to keep their wells open. As a result, our Nation lost at least 500,000 barrels per day due to the closure of hard-to-reopen stripper wells. So, what the legislation says is that when the price of stripper well oil goes below $15 a barrel, that there would be an authorization for that oil to be purchased in order, one, to fill up the Strategic Petroleum Reserve but, secondly, in order to keep the price of stripper well oil high enough so that there is an incentive for that industry to continue to make the proper investment in maintaining them as viable domestic sources of energy for our country. As well, the legislation made it possible for there to be constructed a Regional Home Heating Oil Reserve in the northeastern part of the United States. That is very important to those of us that live within a region that does have, on an ongoing basis, the threat that we are going to be cut off from that home heating oil supply. Last winter, our region experienced a very severe spike the price of home heating oil, and supplies were so tight that had the bad weather continued we faced the very real prospect of being just a few days away from having no supply on hand to meet the needs of our constituents. This was simply unacceptable. Now, maybe over the next 20 years, as Sable Island, this rich resource of natural gas off of the Newfoundland coast comes on line, and as our constituents convert over to gas, we may not need this kind of protection. But that is not really going to be possible for another 5, 10, 15 years before it fully penetrates the entire Northeast. And by the Northeast, I also mean Eastern Pennsylvania, all of New Jersey, and the State of New York. Those are the parts of our country that are very much dependent upon imported oil for home heating. Now, we have, without question, the need to give the President the flexibility that he needs to release the heating oil from the reserve in the event we have a repetition of the type of severe price spikes, supply disruptions or severe weather situations that we saw last winter which drove home heating oil prices over the $2 a gallon level. This provision helped assure that as we are reauthorizing EPCA, that we are addressing both the needs of the producing States, who are worried about what happens when prices go too low, and the consuming States, who worry about what happens when prices get too high. Now, H.R. 2884 is currently sitting over in the other body. So far, the leadership in that body has failed to take any action on the bill. I am informed, however, that there may be some efforts underway to work out an agreement on both the stripper well and the Northeast Home Heating Oil Reserve provisions that will be acceptable to various Senators and to the Administration. If so, perhaps we can soon send the EPCA reauthorization to the President's desk that contains both the stripper well and regional reserve provisions. But what we also need to do, and what the amendment that gentleman from Pennsylvania, the gentleman from Texas, and myself would accomplish, is to demonstrate to the other body that this House is seriously committed to an EPCA reauthorization that contains both the Northeast Home Heating Oil and stripper well provisions. And so, if you were one of the 416 Members who on April 12th of this year voted for H.R. 2884, the EPCA reauthorization to create a Northeast Home Heating Oil Reserve, you should vote ``aye'' today to assure that we can make the Reserve a reality. At the same time, I would hope and expect that the Appropriators would recognize the urgent need to provide the estimated $10 million in funding needed to get the Northeast Reserve up and running. We cannot afford to wait and delay on this matter any loner. It is time to act now. I urge adoption of this bipartisan amendment.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce legislation to permanently prohibit ``per minute,'' or time sensitive, access charges on Internet telephone calls. Mr. Speaker, telephone calls over the Internet--often referred to as ``IP telephony'' or ``VOIP (voice over Internet protocol)''--has a bright future for telecommunications competitors and consumers but only if we succeed in treating it from a regulatory standpoint in a way that is consistent with the flat rate nature of the Internet itself. The legislation I am introducing today prevents per minute access charges on the providers of Internet telephone service. This prohibition would cover any per minute access charges irrespective of whether such access charges are levied for the purpose of universal service funding or for any underlying cost of providing such access. A little history of how we got here I believe is important. Back in the late 1980s, the Reagan FCC was poised to abandon the access charge exemption that so-called ``enhanced service providers'' such as Prodigy and Compuserve had enjoyed. I convened hearings as then- Telecommunications Subcommittee Chairman to battle any per minute access charge on this nascent information industry. At a Boston field hearing in October of 1987, I argued to the Chairman of the FCC that it was vital to nurture and foster the development of this new industry and that the resulting rate shock from per minute fees would destroy the economic base of the information providers. I was greatly concerned that the FCC proposal would put this exciting service out of reach financially for millions of consumers. Successfully defeating that Reagan FCC proposal was one of the key decisions in the development of the Internet. In other words, it was not by accident that the Internet has developed largely as a flat rate medium, it was by design--but not without a battle. Recently, the House of Representatives approved a bill (H.R. 1291) that purportedly was crafted to address a ``threat'' that Congress or the FCC was going to impose access charges on the Internet. No such threat exists. Nevertheless many Members of Congress had received letters--generated by rumors on the Internet--about a bill that would impose a ``modem tax,'' or a per minute fee, on email or consumers' general Internet use. This fictitious bill--sponsored by the equally fictitious Representative Schnell--allegedly aimed to impose new fees on Internet use. The bill that the House approved however, didn't technically prohibit access charges on the Internet--the bill only prohibits access charge fees that would support universal service. It did not prohibit per minute access charges that could be assessed by local phone companies for recovering access costs that did not go into any universal service support mechanism. Most shocking, however, is the fact that the bill includes a legislative ``green light'' to the FCC to support per minute fees on internet telephone calls by specifically exempting IP telephony from H.R. 1291's (albeit incomplete) access charge prohibition. This big ``legislative wink'' that the bill's supporters give to the FCC, i.e., to look at access charges on Internet telephony providers may accelerate and embolden efforts by local phone companies to pressure the FCC into permitting local phone companies to assess per minute charges on IP telephony providers. Congress should not, in my view, be expressly and overtly exempting Internet telephone calls from the current access charge exemption. Moreover, my legislation to close the IP telephone exemption contained in H.R. 1291 would also mitigate against the creation of a potentially huge privacy issue. Who is going to monitor your Internet usage to see which of your bits are email bits, which are websurfing bits, and which are bits representing telephone calls? The bill I introduce today is designed to remedy this situation. It is based upon the amendment that I offered in the House Commerce Committee to prohibit the FCC from authorizing per minute charges on Internet telephony. I believe we need to safeguard the flat rate nature of the Internet for consumers. Mr. Speaker, I hope my colleagues in the House will look favorably upon this policy.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, as the Ranking Member of the Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Telecommunications, Trade and Consumer Protection, and as one of the two Democrats appointed to serve on the conference committee to resolve differences between S. 761, the Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act, and the House amendments to the bill, I wish to indicate that I concur with the extension of remarks today submitted to the Record by the Gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) with respect to this legislation. I have had an opportunity to review the gentleman from Michigan's extension of remarks concerning certain insertions previously placed into the Record by other conferees. I agree with the Gentleman from Michigan's responses to these remarks. There was no joint explanatory statement prepared in connection with the conference report on S. 761, and the Gentleman from Michigan quite properly notes, certain statements made in the extensions of remarks previously submitted by the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Bliley) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Abraham) do not accurately reflect the intent or understanding of the conferees. Moreover, some of these statements are simply not correct or conflict with the plain language of the statute. In addition to the matters discussed in the Gentleman from Michigan's statement, I would also like to mention an additional matter which I believe merits clarification. I note that Senator Abraham states that the ``reference in section 101(a) of the conference agreement to `any transaction in or affecting interstate commerce' is intended to include electronic records, signatures and agreements governed by the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 and all electronic records, signatures and agreements used in financial planning, income tax preparation and investments.'' The scope of section 101 is actually narrower; it is limited to ``transactions'' involving ``consumers''. For example, the conferees defines transactions to include ``an action or set of actions relating to the conduct of business, consumer, or commercial affairs'' and consciously rejected including governmental affairs as a whole. The bill does not purport to affect all records, signatures and agreements governed in general by the federal securities laws or ``used in financial planning, income tax preparation and investments''.

Mr. MARKEY

Mr. MARKEY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, the bill that is on the floor today takes the word ``education'' out of public broadcasting. The bill that is on the floor here today takes the word ``education'' out of nonprofit educational television stations. The bill that is on the floor here today changes 50 years of American history with regard to the public's relationship with public broadcasting stations and removes the word ``education'' as a requirement, as a mandate, with regard to how the managers of a particular public broadcasting station have to serve an individual community. If this bill passes, never again will there ever be a test applied by the Federal Communications Commission that ensures that the educational needs of the community are being served by a public broadcasting station. Instead, they insert the word ``religious'' without any definition, without any restrictions in terms of how many hours a day, how many weeks out of the year, how many years in a row; the totality, the entirety of the broadcasting can be religious on a public broadcasting station. Historically, religions have been able to run public broadcasting stations, but using the guidance that they must be primarily educational. That is what the Markey amendment does. It requires that the educational goals that historically have been the core of public broadcasting stations are maintained, while still allowing for there to be a religious component, but within the larger context of educating the entire community and not just a subpart of that community.