Dave Obey

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I will not take the 2 minutes. I simply want to, on this side of the aisle, express our congratulations to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Hefner) for the wonderful service he has provided this institution. He has worked for as long as he has been here for decent working conditions and decent living conditions for our American servicemen and servicewomen, and I think this institution owes him a debt of gratitude for the work he his done on behalf of all of them.

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Speaker, the rule under which this bill was considered contains a self-executing provision, the effect of which was to delay from anywhere between 2 and 5 years the Consumer Product Safety Commission's adoption of a rule protecting consumers from flammable furniture. Because of the way that rule was adopted, Members were precluded from offering any amendments to that provision. The proponents of that provision will say that all this provision does is to allow for more study and to get more science before the Commission proceeds. In fact, in my view, the real purpose of this provision is to stall and stall and stall some more, in hopes that eventually they will get a commission with a different makeup so that the rule will never proceed at all. Mr. Speaker, this is part of a pattern. What has been happening is that law firms around this town have been hired by clients. Those clients are hired to prevent action by the government to prevent consumers or workers from being protected by new actions of the government. So whether it is children's pajamas or whether it is OSHA being precluded from offering a new rule to stop the development of carpal tunnel syndrome by millions of workers or whether it is consumers continuing to die because of flammable furniture, those law firms find friendly voices in Congress who will carry out their wishes and we wind up with language like this in the bill. I think the issue is very simple in this case. More deaths occur in this country from upholstered furniture than from any other product under the Consumer Product Safety Commission jurisdiction. So the vote is very simple. If Members want to vote to save lives, Members will vote for this amendment to allow the Commission to proceed to develop rules that will protect the public from flammable furniture. If Members want to let yet another industry continue to expose consumers to life-threatening products, then Members will vote against the amendment. It is as simple as that. I would urge an aye vote on the motion to recommit.

Mr. OBEY. I certainly am, Mr. Speaker.

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

Mr. OBEY

Mr. OBEY. The fact is I cannot get into the head of OMB or anybody else around here. All I know is that we have a choice. The choice is whether or not we are going to tell Members that things are so that are not so. The fact is, Members are being told by your side that this will not shut down FHA. The fact is absent new statutory authority, it most certainly will. And your amendment will in fact cripple the ability of FHA to deliver housing to people in this country. Now, that is a fact, whether you admit it or not.

Mr. OBEY. I would suggest what you are saying is if this causes heartburn to all of the people who we supposedly helped in the Neumann amendment last week on FHA housing, you are saying: ``So be it.'' I do not think you ought to treat homeowners that way, either; certainly not struggling working people who need FHA to get access to the housing market.

Mr. OBEY. And so you would not be saving one dime. You would simply be adding in the real world as opposed to the green eyeshade accounting world, you would simply be adding more money to the budget. What you are suggesting is that there is a way that we can sneak around the budget limits without getting caught, and I thought that the CATs were opposed to stuff like that.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, let me simply say that the only use of any colloquy, if they have any use at all, is to explain legislative history. If readers of the Record want to know what the legislative history is, they need to read more than the comments of two Members of the Congress who agree with each other, who get up for 2 minutes and think that they have taken a public opinion poll. The fact is that the Knollenberg amendment has been modified by the Obey amendment, and it seems to me that there is no accurate description of what that amendment means, as amended, unless all parties to the action actually have a consensus.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, I do this as a courtesy to the House to give plenty of notice as to what my motion to recommit will be, if we ever get to that point tonight. Let me explain briefly what it will be. There are provisions in this bill which, in essence, prevent the Consumer Product Safety Commission from enforcing new regulations with respect to fire retardant furniture. Language was adopted to this bill which will prohibit the enforcement of provisions that are designed to protect people from flammable furniture. So I will simply be offering a motion to strike the sentence beginning on line 7 on page 55 and strike section 425 of the bill. Mr. Chairman, I will be doing this, frankly, because I think this proposal in the bill is masquerading under false pretenses. Supporters of the provision in the bill will be saying, well, what is more reasonable than simply providing more time for the study of the matter before the Consumer Product Safety Commission can take up a new rule? What I think would be more reasonable is that we quit allowing lawyers to jerk this Congress around and get to the point of actually protecting the public from a serious safety hazard. I want to say, Mr. Chairman, this is going on governmentwide, whether we are talking about consumer products and pajamas for children, or whether we are talking about flammable furniture, or whether we are talking about OSHA in its efforts to try to protect workers from repetitive motion injuries. In each case, we have got smart law firms in this town who put together a case on behalf of their clients. They go to a friendly Member of Congress or a friendly committee or a friendly Chamber of the Congress, and they say, ``Boys and girls, why don't you help us out? Shield us from regulatory action.'' Well, when we shield them from regulatory action, we really expose the general public and workers in this country to dangerous products, dangerous work facilities, and the result is injured workers, the result is injured children, and in some cases we have the death of children and the death of consumers. So, Mr. Chairman, it just seems to me that this Congress is going to have to make a choice. We are either going to stand with the law firms that advocate for these special interests or we are going to stand for the public that we are supposed to represent. So, I will be offering that motion at the proper time and wanted to give the House notice of that fact now.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, we did not hear that exchange. I would like to have the question repeated.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I have a point of order.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman.

Mr. OBEY. So that is why the gentleman from California said, in essence, that if this amendment is passed, it would shut down the ability of the FHA to function without these services to American homeowners.

Mr. OBEY. And is it not true that those services are, for instance, appraisals that FHA is required to obtain and computer services, without which FHA could not function and could not cut checks that they are supposed to cut?

Mr. OBEY. Let me also then ask the gentleman, is it not true that the effect of this amendment goes to the services which are contracted for by FHA?

Mr. OBEY. So there is no increase in the amount of money available to the FHA for these administrative purposes?

Mr. OBEY. I yield to the gentleman from California.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. I would like to ask the gentleman from California a number of questions, if he would not mind responding. I wonder if the gentleman would be willing to answer a number of questions about how the FHA fund works. It has just been alleged that the FHA funding level for administrative purposes is 50 percent above last year's level. Is it not true that in the past, FHA funded these operations simply by taking their own funds and using them without a congressional appropriation? And is it not true that OMB said that they could no longer do that, that they could only perform those functions if they actually got an appropriation from Congress? And is it not, therefore, a fact that there is no real increase whatsoever in the dollar level that is available to FHA for these purposes?

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I would like to explain this amendment, because it is not apparent on its face what it does. Without reading the rest of the bill, although it appears to be reducing funds for veterans' medical care, it, in reality, does just the opposite. Reducing the amount available for equipment and land and structures by $69 million in budget authority provides, in reality, $53 million more for actual spending in outlays for veterans' health care, and I would like to explain to the House why. For the past few years, the administration and the Congress have been engaged in a budgetary slight of hand to try to make dwindling resources stretch further. The device is called the delayed equipment obligation. The gimmick is to provide several hundred million dollars for the equipment needs of the VA health care system and then to prohibit the VA from actually using those funds until very late in the fiscal year, thus temporarily saving outlays. Last year, $570 million was provided for equipment with the obligations delayed until August. This year's budget level requires even grander thinking. The administration proposed to delay the obligation of $635 million for equipment, land and structures; and faced with an extremely tight budget allocation, the Committee on Appropriations recommended that $846 million for equipment be delayed for obligation until next August. The impact of increasing the amount of delayed equipment obligation by more than $200 million above the request is to actually reduce the basic medical care amount to a level $276 million below the 1998 program. This is simply unacceptable, in the view of many veterans' organizations. To the extent possible, while remaining within budget totals, my amendment seeks to adjust that imbalance. It reduces the delayed equipment obligation by $69 million in Budget Authority and increases the basic medical care activity by a similar amount. The effect is to make funds available at the start of the fiscal year for hands-on health care delivered to veterans. To do this results in $53 million more in that spending during the year, according to the CBO. That is the amount of outlays that currently are available and unused, left on the table, as it were, in this bill. For those concerned about the size of the VA's medical equipment backlog, Mr. Chairman, let me say that my amendment still provides $775 million for such requirements. That is $205 million above the 1998 level, $140 million above the Administration's 1999 request, and $88 million above the Senate's recommendation. Because it results in more hands-on veterans medical care, earlier this year veterans groups supported my amendment. Here I have a letter from the Paralyzed Veterans Association, another from the Blinded Veterans Association, and another from the Disabled American Veterans, all indicating support for this amendment, and other letters will be forthcoming. To summarize, this is a simple amendment. It does not hurt any program. It takes the outlays that are left on the table. There is no offset required to accelerate spending for veterans' health. Reduced equipment obligations by $69 million actually increases hands-on medical care by the same amount. That is what the veterans want. That is what the veterans organization groups feel they need. That is what this House ought to do.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. OBEY. I would like to simply point out that there is no statutory authority for the agency to continue to do this through mandatory spending. If there were, then they would simply be spending the same amount of dollars in mandatory spending as they are spending through appropriated accounts.

Mr. OBEY. Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman and ranking member.