Commending the State of Kuwait for granting women certain important political rights.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 351 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

The resolution before us is the rule for the consideration of a package of four bills, H.R. 739, 740, 741, and 742. They are pieces of legislation which passed with a significant bipartisan majority in the 108th Congress and are once again being brought to the floor today to help reduce the impact of unduly burdensome regulations for American small businesses and thereby enhancing American competitiveness, and to restore fairness in applying workplace safety regulations to small business.

The rule before us, House Resolution 351, provides for the separate consideration of each of these four bills. Under the rule, each bill will have its own debate time and the opportunity to be thoroughly debated and voted on by this body.

Finally, the rule also provides that at the close of consideration of these measures, the Clerk of the House will be directed to combine the text of each of these bills that do pass the House under this rule as one engrossed bill, and send that bill to our friends on the other side of this Capitol, where they will have a better opportunity this time to be both deliberative and, hopefully, active at the same time.

While this may seem to be a complicated rule, the effect is quite simple. The bills brought up for consideration under this rule will allow small businesses to focus more of their energy on competing in the marketplace, providing their customers with better goods and better services and creating new jobs across America, rather than spending their time paying questionable fines, wrangling with regulators, worrying about the uncertainties created by an inadequate dispute process, created by staffing shortages, or having to pay for lawyers' fees to help fight a just cause with occasionally insensitive, but most often distant, Federal bureaucracy in Washington, D.C.

The gentleman from Ohio (Chairman Boehner) and the subcommittee chairman, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Norwood), as well as the hard work by both Republican and Democratic Members of this committee, are to be commended in bringing a well-balanced small business fairness package to the floor today.

The first of these four bills, 739, which is the Occupational Safety and Health for Small Businesses Day in Court Act, tries to provide flexibility to employers filing responses to OSHA citations.

We currently have a hard and very arbitrary standard of 15 days to respond to an OSHA citation, even though in the 1980s, the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure granted employer relief to file a late notice if there was a mistake, inadvertence, a surprise, or excusable neglect.

This bill simply codifies this commonsense practice. Hard and fast deadlines in instances sometimes work an injustice, but in any case they provide only a safe standard for the bureaucrats, but lack the common sense to help small businesses which were clearly recognized in the Federal Rules on Civil Procedure.

There is no good reason why we should not codify for all what is occasionally given to some and allow for some discretion in granting relief to innocent employers for, as the law says, mistake, inadvertence, surprise or excusable neglect. There should be no controversy over this commonsense bill.

The second bill, H.R. 740, the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission Efficiency Act of 2005, provides for the addition of two additional members to the review commission, and the additional human resources will allow it to complete its work in a timely fashion for the benefit of both employers and employees. For two-thirds of the life span of the review commission's existence, the commission has frequently been paralyzed by vacancies that have resulted in several critical and well-documented inefficiencies and rendered the entire regulatory scheme devised by Congress to resolve OSHA disputes as unworkable. The byproduct of this breakdown delays final adjudication. It harms real business. It hinders real job creation. There is a simple and easy way to resolve this particular problem.

The third bill, H.R. 741, the independent review of OSHA citations, by legislative history and practice, OSHA was designed to be responsible for rule-making, enforcement and adjudication. But Congress also established a review commission. Its intention was to give an independent review of OSHA functions as a check on prosecutorial excesses by OSHA.

A 1984 court decision extended the concept of administrative deference to the agency and subsequent court decision which have been conflicting, have compounded the problem, and conflicted the process of checks and balances Congress intended. This bill simply restores responsible checks and balances to the current system by making it clear that it is the commission's legal interpretation that should be given proper judicial deference.

Finally, Mr. Speaker, the fourth bill, H.R. 742, deals with small employers' access to justice. This simply provides for a small employer to have payment of attorney fees when that small employer prevails in litigation that was prompted by the issuance of a citation by OSHA. The legislation is simple in its rationale: Small business people should not be intimidated into blindly following mandates because they do not think they can afford to fight a case in court in which they would otherwise prevail. This levels the playing

field so that small businessmen and businesswomen have an equal chance with powerful government bureaucracies that have virtually unlimited legal resources of the Federal Government behind them. This bill helps the mom-and-pop businesses to be able to have the courage to speak up for themselves when they are right.

Small businesses still provide a majority of the jobs in this country, and they feel the economic pressure brought by government regulations and taxes every day. It is only fair that through these four bills in these very specific areas that we take care to remove any economic incentives for the fostering of an insensitive Federal regulatory bureaucracy.

Mr. Speaker, these are four commonsense good bills which, once again, enjoyed a bipartisan majority of Members' support in the 108th Congress.

Our country has had 35 years of experience with OSHA. As documented in testimony before the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, modest improvements are needed to restore balance to the regulatory scheme through these bills as they relate to small business. Last year, the Office of Management and Budget reported to the Congress the annual cost of major Federal regulations for the decade from 1992 to 2002 was somewhere between $38 and $44 billion which means that, for every dollar we spend for regulation, we also as a government spend $1.50 for compliance costs and the private sector spends $45 in compliance costs.

The over-regulation of business puts us at a competitive disadvantage with the rest of the world, places unlimited, unnecessary limits on our economy and harms the consumer.

I am proud the congressional leadership is continuing to look at ways to pare back the overwhelming growth in regulation and bureaucracy, and I urge my colleagues to support the rule for these four bills to keep American businesses competitive in a global marketplace, to keep jobs here in America. I urge my colleagues to support this rule and the underlying bills.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I am appreciative of being able to talk about the four bills dealing with regulatory reform, all of which have had full debate in the committee this year, as well as full debate in the committee last year. And the Committee on Rules did approve every amendment that was germane. Unfortunately, of the three amendments that were present, none of them were germane to the topic of regulatory reform.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 7 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Norwood), the subcommittee chairman, to address this rule.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to note that, though I appreciate the very articulate remarks of the gentleman from California about the issue at hand, which is a significant issue we should somehow debate, I remind him that we are talking here about reform of a regulatory process of OSHA. The gentleman's comments are not germane to this particular bill. There will be a point in time for that discussion, but we should not cloud what this bill is actually doing.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 6 minutes to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Davis) to hopefully clarify this.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, once again, I have enjoyed the articulate and emotional discussion that has gone forward on this rule so far. Eventually, we may actually have a bill that meets the debate.

I would remind my colleagues that these four packages are how we help small business negotiate through the stream of Federal regulation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Chairman Boehner) to once again reemphasize that point.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Norwood), subcommittee chairman.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, last term, when I was a freshman here, having had some State legislative experience, I remember sitting back there by the rail talking to some other freshmen saying one of the things we need to do desperately in this body is have the rule that there should be one bill and one issue. If we did that, it would create better transparency and actually better legislation that people would understand.

I think our discussions today illustrate that point. I have a great deal of empathy for the gentleman from Texas who spoke a few moments ago, a good friend, a good legislator, and he said, the bills we have before us would not solve the problem that he introduced. He was totally accurate, because the topic of his amendment is not the same as the topic of the bills we have before us today, which is why they were ruled nongermane and not put in on the rule itself.

I think we have had some fascinating words that I have enjoyed. I am going to call it fascinating rhetoric today, not really debate, because like ships passing in the night that never touch, so has our discussion from both sides of the aisle gone forward, but never really discussed the same topic at the same particular time.

The four bills we have before us are very narrow in their approach, and they are very good bills, because they help small businessmen and small business women to try and negotiate the rule process with OSHA. They deserve our support, as they deserve the support they got last year when they were discussed in committee; last year when we passed them with bipartisan support on the floor; this year, once again, as they were discussed in committee, because the goal of those bills is to eliminate the conflict between the Federal Government and small business and, instead, to enhance cooperation. And that enhanced cooperation will make a better atmosphere for the business community in America and make a better country for all of us. That is the point of these four very good, very narrow and very specific bills.

I urge the Members to support this rule. It is a fair rule. I urge the Members to support the four underlying bills. They are good bills.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Bishop) for the time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong opposition to this closed rule and all four of the underlying pieces of legislation that it encompasses. For those who did not hear me the first time, I said four pieces of legislation under one closed rule.

This is a quadruple coupon day in the House of Representatives, Mr. Speaker. Four opportunities to shut off democracy for the price of one. What is perhaps most offensive about the rule is the fact that not one amendment was made in order for any of the four bills. Let me repeat that: Not one amendment was made in order for any of the four underlying bills.

Closed rules are an affront to our democracy. We should stop it now. My outrage and the outrage of all on this side of the aisle is as much about process as it is about policy. Pure partisan politics never produces sound public policy. And patronizing corporate interests to pad one's campaign coffers has no place in the people's House. Yet, that is all the majority seems interested in doing.

The political score Republicans are seeking to settle with their barrage of anti-working-class legislation is not going to be fulfilled by stifling debate and blocking Democrats out of the process. Republicans are calling this the OSHA fairness package. Fair for who? There are only losers with these bills, Mr. Speaker, and the biggest victim is the American worker. All four of the underlying pieces of legislation represent a buffet of rollbacks in our laws governing working conditions.

Mr. Speaker, do we have an overwhelming epidemic in this country of ridiculous and overzealous workplace lawsuits that I do not know about? The judicial process for violations and workplace health and safety standards has been in place for nearly 30 years. It is fair, and most importantly, it protects the rights of workers. Yet, two of the underlying bills affecting OSHA standards are coming as a direct result of recent court rulings that Republicans and their corporate friends do not agree with. The other two are aimed at stacking the OSHA commission with anti-worker commissioners and creating a system where only those who can afford legal representation will be permitted to file a complaint with the Workplace Safety and Health Board.

Mr. Speaker, I do not like the new policy of this Congress which can best be described as ``when the courts rule against you, legislate against the courts.''

Why are we stifling Members from offering thoughtful amendments? Just one example, if I may. The ranking Democrat on the Committee on Education and the Workforce, my good friend, the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller), a man who served in this body for 30 years and is known throughout the country as a champion for working- class Americans, Republicans denied him the opportunity to offer a substitute to one of the underlying bills that came out of his committee.

Had the majority made the Miller substitute in order, the House could have done something today that would have actually benefited working- class Americans. We could have had a real debate about increasing the minimum wage to a meager $7.25 an hour.

Realize, this is an amount that while above the current level of $5.15 is significantly below the much needed living wage that is needed to pull someone making the minimum wage 40 hours a week above the poverty line. In blocking the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller) from offering his amendment, Republicans are again proving that they are anything but the people's party. Perhaps the majority is blocking what it knows it cannot defeat, or better yet, perhaps the majority is just protecting its members from taking a vote that will show their true colors. Shame on them and shame on this body if it allows this assault on American workers to continue. None of us in this body would want to live on $5.15 an hour. None of us would want to work three jobs just to make ends meet. None of us would want to work three jobs and still have no health care. Yet, that is what we are asking, no, requiring millions of our fellow citizens to do.

When the opportunity to increase the minimum wage presents itself, Republicans blocked House Members from voting on it. At least in the other body, while the leadership opposed an increase in the minimum wage, they at least permitted a vote. Protecting the rights of those most in need is the cornerstone of our great democracy. I refuse to remain silent while those on the other side of the aisle seek to dismiss this cardinal American value.

I urge my colleagues to reject the closed rule and oppose the underlying pieces of legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller), a champion of worker rights.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Owens).

(Mr. OWENS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I kind of question whether a closed rule is fair, but I hear the chairman.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gene Green).

(Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Washington (Mr. McDermott).

(Mr. McDERMOTT asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Solis).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

First, I heard several times that the matter of the minimum wage is not germane to the four measures included in this one rule. The simple fact of the matter is that an amendment was offered at the Committee on Rules last night and that amendment was voted down on a party-line vote. So at least a discussion during the period of the rule allows the germaneness of the question having to do with the minimum wage, not so much of the substance of the base bill.

I will be asking Members to vote ``no'' on the previous question, Mr. Speaker, so I can amend the rule and allow the House to vote on the Miller-Owens bill to increase the Federal minimum wage. This amendment was offered in the Committee on Rules, as I just said, last night, but was defeated on a straight party-line vote.

My amendment to the rule would provide that immediately after the House adopts this rule, it will bring H.R. 2429 to the House floor for an up-or-down vote. This bill will gradually increase the minimum wage for Americans from the current level of $5.15 an hour to $7.25 an hour after about 2 years.

Mr. Speaker, it is time we in the House started helping American workers instead of taking away their rights as the four underlying bills in this rule do. I think one of the best things we can do to help working families is to increase the minimum wage. It has been nearly 10 years since this Congress has voted to increase the minimum wage, an increase that was signed into law by President Clinton in August of 1996. Since that time, the value of that increase has eroded by 20 percent. A full-time minimum wage earner is working 40 hours a week, makes about $10,700 annually, an amount that is $5,000 below the poverty line for a family of three.

Clearly we are way overdue for another increase. Somehow we have had time to implement numerous tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans, but we have turned our backs on those who work the hardest and are paid the least, those who struggle to make ends meet every day.

I think it is time this Congress developed a conscience and started helping those who need help the most.

Mr. Speaker, I urge all Members of this body to vote ``no'' on the previous question so we can help these 7.5 million American workers who directly benefit from an increase in the minimum wage.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the grounds that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time opposing this rule.

I would like to express my disappointment that the Committee on Rules refused to allow a vote on an amendment that has bipartisan support, an amendment that would require to list contract workers on their injury site log.

This was not a major expense or an inconvenience for employers, yet the Committee on Rules defeated it on a party-line vote.

The bills that are up today are not major legislation. They may correct individual problems, and each of them need to be debated, and they should be. But not to allow other needed OSHA reforms is a travesty of this House because of the situation I am getting ready to talk about. Our amendment was defeated on a party-line vote, even though we have bipartisan support on the original legislation that was introduced in March of this year.

Mr. Speaker, 15 people lost their lives during an explosion and fire at a refinery in Texas City. This is a picture of the site, and I include for the Record a copy of the Baytown Sun article on the

deadly accident. This picture shows the site in Texas City.

The bills that are allowed under this rule will do nothing to help the 15 people killed in this accident. Nothing. That is what the travesty is on this floor today.

A series of news articles quickly discovered that it is extremely difficult to assess the safety of such facilities due to the way employers are required to keep their site logs of injuries on the work site. While all deaths and injuries are reported to OSHA, only those involving direct employees of the site-controlling company are required to be maintained on the site incident log. This means that the incidents involving contract workers or part-time workers do not show up on the injury log employers are required to keep by law. Unfortunately, because current law does not require them to do so, the site log will look just the same as it did the day before March 23. It will show no lives were lost.

Those 15 workers who died on this site were contract workers, and they should be reported. Residents and communities surrounding these facilities have a right to know if they live near a place that could endanger them if something were to go wrong. If we had full disclosure of these incidents, the free market system may be able to work. Workers are less willing to work in hazardous environments, so facilities would have incentives to improve safety. Right now, it is nearly impossible to determine exactly how many accidents have occurred at a particular site without cross-referencing contracts between employers and contractors.

OSHA has known these reporting requirements were a problem for 14 years, and yet here we are today dealing with three pieces of legislation that deal with nothing to do with contract workers.

In 1989, one of the most serious plant explosions in our country occurred at a plant in Pasadena, Texas, and I am honored to represent that area. This accident killed 23 workers and injured 232 others. As a result, OSHA called for a study regarding the use of contract labor in the petrochemical industry. This study was conducted while the first George Bush was President, and this study found there was a lack of adequate injury and incident data. It states that current data reporting procedures do not capture the full range of injury or illnesses experienced in the industry because the injury statistics do not include the experience of contract workers.

This amendment does not require an industry to do anything more than record injuries and accidents on their site log regardless of whether they are their employee or someone working on their site. I am not here to bash employers or OSHA. The bottom line is that neighbors and employees have the right to know. These bills that we are considering today may very well weaken job safety, but I do not think they are that major. We should be working on a bipartisan basis to solve problems and prevent deaths and injuries like what happened on March 23, 2005, in Texas City, Texas. That is why these three bills are woefully inadequate to deal with the problems that we have with on-site job injuries right now.

[From the Baytown Sun, June 29, 2005]

Alarms, Instrumentation Failed in BP Refinery Blast

(By Pam Easton)

Nassau Bay.--Key pieces of instrumentation and alarms at

BP's Texas City refinery weren't working properly in March

when explosions rocked the plant, killing 15 and injuring

more than 170, federal investigators said Tuesday.

Don Holmstrom, lead investigator with U.S. Chemical Safety

and Hazard Investigation Board, said an alarm within the

isomerization unit--where the explosion occurred--didn't work

properly until after the explosions had begun.

Holmstrom also said a sensor in a section of the raffinate

splitter, which separates chemicals for gasoline production,

indicated the liquid level in the tower was decreasing when

it was instead flooding. Another alarm that should have

sounded when the liquid exceeded 10 feet high didn't

activate, ``even as the liquid flooded more than 12 times

that height,'' Holmstrom said.

Among the 15 people killed in the March 23 explosion, seven

were from Baytown or surrounding communities.

They were: Jimmy Hunnings, 58, of Baytown; Morris Raymond

``Monk'' King, 57 of Baytown; Susan Duhan Taylor, 33, of

Baytown; Ralph Herrera Jr. 27, of Baytown; Larry Linsenbardt,

58 of Mont Belvieu; Ryan Rodriguez, 28, of Dayton; and Lorena

``Lori'' Cruz, 32 of La Porte.

BP spokesman Ronnie Chappell said the federal safety

board's findings are similar to the company's own

investigation completed in May.

The company blamed staff errors for the March 23 explosion

and fire. Among the procedural lapses company executives

cited were a lack of supervision and a six-minute window in

which unit supervisors could have sounded an alarm to

evacuate the area, but didn't.

``If personnel responsible for the safe startup of the isom

unit had followed procedures, the fire and explosion would

not have occurred,'' Chappell said Tuesday.

An alarm notified operators of a liquid level that was too

high in the raffinate splitter at 3:05 a.m. on March 23,

company records show. An operator silenced the alarm, but an

illuminated warning remained on screens and the alarm

remained in effect until 1:20 p.m., the time of the blast,

Holmstrom said.

Meanwhile, liquid-level indicators drifted down from 100

percent to 79 percent beginning at 7:30 a.m., and

``erroneously indicated to operators that the liquid level in

the tower was below 10 feet and was falling back toward a

normal value.''

However, the 164-foot tower was instead flooded with liquid

that reached 120 feet or more, Holmstrom said. A normal level

is below 10 feet.

When the excess liquid and vapor was discharged, it

overwhelmed one of the unit's systems, causing the vapor and

liquid to be released and ignited by a still-unknown source.

Holmstrom said federal investigators will spend the next

four to six weeks testing at least 30 instruments and other

equipment in the isomerization unit, which boosts the octane

level in gasoline. Federal investigators have also asked BP

for equipment maintenance records. Chappell said BP was

cooperating.

Holmstrom said it is ``unprecedented'' for his

investigators to spend so much time looking into equipment,

instrumentation and their possible failures.

``Our objective is to understand why this tragedy occurred,

and, we hope, to prevent similar occurrences in the future,''

he said.

The board will hold a public meeting to discuss complete

findings of the federal probe this fall, Holmstrom added.

Chappell said BP and federal investigators have the same

goal.

``We want to ascertain exactly what occurred and take

action to prevent something like this from ever happening

again,'' he said.

The blast was the plant's third accident in a year,

following a March 2004 explosion that caused an evacuation.

Mr. Speaker, I join my colleagues in rising in the defense of America's working poor. Instead of weakening workplace safety and not doing this today as the majority intends to do, we ought to be strengthening the American family by raising the minimum wage.

Mr. Speaker, I include for the Record a report by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service which shows that minimum wage will be at the lowest value as a percentage of poverty in nearly half a century.

Mr. Speaker, it has been 8 years since Congress has increased the minimum wage. In those 8 years, Members of Congress have raised their own pay seven times by $28,500.

In those same 8 years, minimum wage workers have not gotten a single raise. They continue to earn $10,700. We have given raises to Federal employees. We have given tax cuts to the extremely wealthy. We have given tax breaks to oil and a host of other big industries. But we have ignored the needs and the plight of America's working poor. This study proves it, and it is time to change it. The current minimum wage fails to provide enough income to enable minimum workers to afford adequate housing in any area of this country. It is inexcusable that today in America nearly one-fifth of children go to bed hungry at night while their parents work full time at minimum wage. Whether one is a Democrat or a Republican, ending child poverty should be central to our domestic agenda. Nearly 3\1/2\ million children have parents who would get an immediate raise if Congress increased the minimum wage.

Hard work is an American value. We teach our children the importance of work and encourage them to do well in

school to achieve a job that rewards it. Despite this, 36 million working Americans live in poverty. Poverty and wage volatility have doubled for full-time, full-year workers since the 1970s. Since President Bush took office, the cost of housing has gone up 33 percent, college tuition has gone up 35 percent, and health insurance has gone up 59 percent. But the working poor have not seen one thin dime.

Leave No Child Behind is a cruel joke. America's future depends on strong families, and if Members believe in values of families, as some say they do, then they would vote this rule down. Every day we prolong raising the minimum wage, we ask families and children to do more with less. It is a bankrupt policy. Instead of rolling back workplace protections or fooling around the edges with that, we should be increasing the minimum wage.

I urge my colleagues to vote against this misguided rule and move on something more important, which is reinvesting in America's people.

July 5, 2005.

Hon. Jim McDermott,

House of Representatives,

Washington, DC.

Memorandum: Historical Relationship Between the Minimum Wage and

Poverty, 1959 to 2005

This memorandum is in response to your request about the

historical relationship been the federal minimum wage and

poverty from 1959 to 2005. In particular, you were interested

in the annual income a full-time, full-year worker earning

the minimum wage would earn relative to the poverty level for

a family of three.

Table 1 shows the effective annual minimum wage from 1959

through 2005 for a full-time full-year worker, relative to

the poverty level for a three-person family. The table shows

when statutory changes to the federal minimum wage became

effective. Average effective minimum wage rates for the year

were calculated based on the pro-rated average of effective

wage rates over the course of the year. For example, in 1997,

the minimum wage was $4.75 per hour for the first eight

months of the year (January through August), and $5.15 per

hour for the last four months of the year (September through

December). The average effective minimum wage for the year is

thus: (($4.75 x 8) + ($5.15 x 4))/12, or $4.8833 per hour.

Here, full-time full-year work is assumed to amount to 2,080

hours of work per year (40 hours per week x 52 weeks).

The poverty income level used here is the U.S. Census

Bureau's average weighted poverty thresholds for a family of

three. The earliest year for which official Census Bureau

poverty income thresholds are available is 1959. Census

Bureau poverty thresholds vary by family size and composition

(e.g., the poverty threshold for a family differs by the

number of children in the family). The average weighted

thresholds reflect the average of the individual thresholds

for a given family size by the observed distribution of

families of varying composition in the population, as

measured by the Census Bureau's Current Population Survey

(CPS). Each year the Census Bureau updates the individual

poverty thresholds to reflect changes in prices, and the

average weighted thresholds, to reflect changes in the

composition of the population for families of each size. The

estimate for 2004 is based on the Census Bureau's preliminary

average weighted poverty thresholds, which reflect price

changes for 2004, but reflect the population weighting from

2003, as opposed to 2004. The final average weighted poverty

thresholds for 2004, scheduled for release this fall, may

differ by a few dollars from those shown here. The

projected poverty thresholds for 2005 are based on the

2004 preliminary weighted poverty thresholds adjusted for

average price inflation from January 2005 to May 2005,

compared to the same period in 2004, which amounted to a

3.1 percent increase in the projected 2005 poverty

thresholds, compared to the 2004 preliminary poverty

thresholds. The Census Bureau will issue preliminary

poverty thresholds for 2005 in January 2006, when price

changes for the 2005 calendar year will be available.

Final weighted poverty thresholds for 2005 won't be

available until the fall of 2006.

Figure 1 depicts the basic trends shown in the table. Table

1 and Figure 1 show that the federal minimum wage was highest

relative to poverty in 1968, when it amounted to 118.7

percent of poverty for a full-time full-year worker

supporting three people. Since 1980, the minimum wage has

been below the poverty line for a full-time full-year worker

supporting a family of three. The most recent increase to the

federal minimum wage to $5.15 per hour in September 1997

(from $4.75 per hour) brought full-time full-year minimum

wage earnings for a family of three up to 82.4 percent of

poverty. Since then, the nominal minimum wage of $5.15 per

hour has eroded relative to the poverty level, which is

adjusted each year for changes in prices. In 2005, full-time

full-year earnings for a minimum wage worker amounts to

$10,712, or 68.9 percent of the estimated projected poverty

level for a family of three ($15,536). Based on the

assumptions used, it is projected that the level of the

minimum wage relative to poverty in 2005 will be at the

lowest level seen at any time over the past 47 years.

Tom Gabe,

Specialist in Social Legislation,

Domestic Social Policy Division.

[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TH12JY05.001

[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TH12JY05.002

Mr. Speaker, I cannot help but add or repeat so our Members know, the amendments that were not accepted from the Democrats had nothing to do with these bills. They were simply not germane, and I know that upsets them, but those are the rules of House.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this rule which provides the House an opportunity today to address four very important bills. These measures in my view are very modest reforms. They have been narrowly drafted to make needed changes in our law, actually for about 34 years, while avoiding the possibility of any reduction in the current levels of workplace protections.

Now, I believe that our committee, at least most of our committee, believes that. As such, a structured rule providing for consideration of these four

measures on their merits in my view is entirely appropriate.

As I will detail later in the debate on these bills, we need to implement these changes because small employers ought to be devoting more of their time and attention to creating new jobs and less on dealing with government lawyers intent on manipulating legal technicalities. And that, in fact, is going on. With that, I will briefly summarize each of these bills for my colleagues.

The first measure for consideration under this rule is H.R. 739, the Occupational Safety and Health Small Business Day in Court. In almost every other court in this Nation, a party that acts in good faith but nonetheless misses a lead deadline that results in a legal default can ask the court to have the case heard on its merits. Currently, there is doubt over whether the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, the agency specifically and importantly created by Congress to hear each legal dispute between an employer and OSHA, has the statutory flexibility to grant this type of relief.

All H.R. 739 does is to provide flexibility that almost every other court in the Nation exercises. We use identical terminology to that used in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Rule 60(b), a rule used by nearly every other court in the Nation.

The second bill provided for under the rule is H.R. 740, the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission Efficiency Act of 2004. Under current law, two members of a three-member panel are needed to constitute a quorum. For 20 percent of its existence, this agency has lacked even a quorum of two. OSHRC has had a full complement of members seated and active for only about one-third of its history. That does not work. That does not work for anybody.

Even now, the commission can be paralyzed only with two members if there is not complete agreement as to all points. To remedy the situation, H.R. 740 proposes, increases the membership of OSHRC from three members to five. This change is modeled on other government agencies and, in particular, the Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission.

H.R. 740 also incorporates a new provision that permits the President to invite an incumbent member of OSHRC whose term has expired to hold over until a replacement can be confirmed by the Senate.

Now, this just makes sense if you want OSHRC to work, and I do. There are some cases that have been over there for 8 years, for pity's sake.

Now, my friends on the other side may say, oh, all they are trying to do is to pack the commission because there is a Republican President. Well, these commissioners do not serve for life. You will have an opportunity sometime in the future maybe to put your own commissioner on there, but we need to get these things resolved. This will solve that.

The next measure to be considered under the rule is H.R. 741, the Occupational Safety and Health Independent Review of OSHA Citations Act of 2005. This one is important, in my view. H.R. 741 simply reinstates congressional intent, and we will say that over and over in the next 4 hours, because an activist judge changed the law of 1971.

The legislative history of the OSH Act clearly indicates that back in 1970 Congress realized that in granting extraordinary and unprecedented authority to OSHA, the agency would need some mechanism to make sure that the authority was not abused. If you study the history on this a little bit, Senator Javitz noted the future of the OSH Act depended on this compromise that created an independent review at the time it was passed, with a Democratic House and a Democratic Senate and a Republican President.

This bill never would have passed had not this review been put in there. H.R. 741 simply restores congressional intent by ensuring that this review is, in fact, an independent one and not dictated by OSHA.

The last measure considered under the rule is H.R. 742, the Occupational Safety and Health Small Employer Access to Justice Act. This measure simply levels the playing field for small employers by encouraging OSHA to better assess the merits of the case before bringing the full force and power of government litigation against small businesses.

To empower small business employers to seek their day in court, H.R. 742 simply provides that if OSH loses, very small employers can recover their attorneys' fees and costs. This remedial measure is important because it has become crystal clear that failings in current law prevent almost any recovery of attorneys' fees in the OSHA environment. I think there has been one and a half a year for the last 24 years.

Mr. Speaker, the rule under consideration provides for ample debate on each of these measures. I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support both this rule and each of the bills we will consider under it.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, I think we all want to make sure that the record is clear. Every court in this country allows for some leeway other than 15 days, and that is simply all this bill actually is doing. We are trying to give these small business owners the same right as litigants in every Federal court in the country. It is not very hard to figure out, and it is not very hard to understand why sometimes some people might lose the letter they get from OSHA. There are good reasons. And to say to them, Oh, gosh, you did not make 15 days? You do not get any justice. You do not get any day in court.

And I just want to put that in the record immediately following the previous speaker so if anybody ever reads it, they might get all the facts.