Nonadmitted and Reinsurance Reform Act of 2006

NONADMITTED AND REINSURANCE REFORM ACT OF 2006 -- (House of Representatives - September 27, 2006)

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Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, as an original cosponsor of this bill, I commend the Financial Services and Judiciary Committees for working together in a bipartisan spirit to move it forward. I especially want to thank Ranking Member Conyers and Ranking Member Frank and you, Chairman Oxley, for your support and leadership.

This bill provides much needed relief to Florida's commercial firms, which are experiencing severe increases, and I mean thousands of percent increases in insurance premiums.

This is not endemic to Florida. It is really happening across the Nation. Surplus lines are a safety valve on traditional insurance markets. In some cases, they are the only way firms can get insurance when regulated lines fail.

Market perception of unsustainable increases in catastrophic risk has resulted in the precipitous decline of insurance coverage availability at astronomical cost to consumers.

This bill expands market capacity to provide surplus lines coverage. It eliminates hundreds of billions of dollars in administrative costs and duplicative filing fees, which are passed on to consumers. Maintaining the status quo means higher costs for commercial firms, consumers, and ultimately our economy.

I encourage my colleagues to support this bill because it ensures that companies are able to obtain insurance, meaning they can stay in our communities, provide much needed jobs and keep our economies strong. Companies in my home State are literally closing their doors or leaving Florida altogether because they cannot get insurance.

I urge my colleagues to support this bill.

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