DeLauro Hails House Defeat of Labor HHS Appropriations Bill As a Victory for Middle Class America and Working Families

DeLauro Hails House Defeat of Labor HHS Appropriations Bill As a Victory for Middle Class America and Working Families

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Congresswoman Rosa L. DeLauro (Conn.-3) today hailed the U.S. House defeat of the Labor-HHS Appropriations bill as a victory. DeLauro is a member of the Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations Subcommittee. Below are her floor remarks as prepared for delivery before the House vote.

"The work of this subcommittee has always reflected our priorities as a nation, helping provide services that help us meet our most basic needs - be they health, our children's education or scientific research that finds the cures of tomorrow. These are challenges that only the Federal government has the ability, the capacity and the resources to help us meet. And the problem with this conference report is that its funding fails to meet that threshold.

"On worker training, this funding falls below last year's levels - this at a time when America is falling behind competitors like China, whose economy is growing 3 times as fast as ours. That is our government's response to this grave threat to American competitiveness.

"The National Institutes of Health, where this subcommittee made historic progress doubling our investment in medical research. Name the disease—childhood leukemia, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, HIV—the work of the NIH has prolonged or improved the life of every single American. But this conference report funds it at the Administration's request - a level that does not even meet inflation.

"Health professions are cut in half - at a time when we face serious shortages in nursing and prepare for the baby boom generation to retire. Head Start, which for 4 decades has provided comprehensive child development, literacy, and family services to more than 18 million pre-schoolers from low-income and working poor families, is funded below last year's level. And with the cost of a college education skyrocketing, this conference report flat funds Pell Grants, meaning the maximum award is exactly the same as it was last year - $4,050. This, when the budget plans to cut another $15 billion in student aid.

"And funding for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program at last year's level as this conference report does will prove disastrous for low-income families. If the devastation following Katrina has taught us anything, it is that good and decent societies take care of their most vulnerable. We failed that test in New Orleans - and we are failing it again with this bill.

"Indeed, this bill fails to invest in any of the priorities important to the American people and to keeping America competitive in the 21st Century. The American people are tired of Congress spending trillions in tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans at the same time they are told we simply do not have the resources to invest in things that impact their daily lives. We can make those investments - but only if we make them a priority.

"That is what the American people want and expect from Congress. Ask any middle-class family what is more important to them - tax cuts for wealthy Americans or lowering the cost of health care, of heating costs or college. They will tell you every time that all they want is something that makes a difference in their lives - their family's lives.

"Making that difference has long been the charge of this subcommittee, having made opportunity real for millions of families—our children, our parents, our neighbors, our ailing relatives—the people we are charged with serving as Members of this Committee. Let's get back to those priorities. Let's get back to working for middle-class America."

http://www.house.gov/delauro/press/2005/November/LHHS_defeat_11_17_05.html