Restoring American Finacial Stability Act of 2010 - Continued

Floor Speech

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Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I do reserve the right to object, and I would like to take a few minutes this afternoon to explain why I will be objecting to this unanimous consent request.

I sat and listened to my three colleagues. I have great empathy for the concern they share. I share it as well. I represent a State that was devastated a little more than 20 years ago when the Exxon Valdez hit the rocks. We lived with oil on our beaches. We know the economic impact. We know the social impact that a spill can cause. We want to all be working together to ensure that whether it is the devastation we see in the hotels in Florida or whether it is the loss to the fishermen, that we ensure those who are responsible pay for the economic loss, for the damages that are incurred. We are with my colleagues on this issue.

The reason I stand and object at this point in time is I do not believe that taking the amount of the liability cap from $75 million, where it is currently, to $10 billion in strict liability, 133 times the size of the current strict liability limit, is where we need to be right now.

I am not just the only one who suggests that maybe we need to understand a little bit better as to how much we might need to look at raising the limit. The administration, just yesterday in their oilspill legislative package, has proposed an effort. Their proposal, would raise the caps on liability for the responsible parties. ``The administration looks forward to working with Congress to develop levels for the various caps that provide for substantial and proportional increases.''

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Ms. MURKOWSKI. If the Senator will allow me to conclude, I will be happy to yield.

I do think we need to look at the liability cap and consider raising it, but
I think we need to be careful about unintended consequences of picking a number, $10 billion.

Let me outline what I am talking about when I say ``unintended consequences.'' This has been named the Big Oil Bailout Prevention Liability Act. I think we have some irony in that what this would do is give all of America's offshore oil resources to the biggest of big oil. It would be impossible, or perhaps close to impossible, for any energy company that is smaller than the supermajors, smaller than the national oil companies, to operate in the OCS. Mr. President, $10 billion in strict liability would preclude their ability to obtain financing, to obtain the bonds or insurance for any exploration.

Look at who is producing in the offshore. It is the independents. They produce two-thirds of the natural gas, one-third of the oil. If we move forward in raising this liability cap to $10 billion, the only companies that are going to be able to self-insure against this level of strict liability are the national oil companies, the supermajors. And we all know who they are. There is the Saudi Aramco. There is Exxon. There is the Chinese National Oil Company and, of course, British Petroleum.

It has been mentioned a couple different times now that we need to ensure that BP, as the responsible party, pays. The comment has been made that $75 million is not going to be sufficient.

What people need to remember is that the cap on the strict liability only applies to what the responsible parties have to pay back in the context of OPA, the Oil Pollution Act. The law expressly--expressly--allows for unlimited damages in State courts where compensatory and punitive damages are already being sought. As we speak, there have been numerous claims filed. Back on April 28, the Louisiana shrimpers filed a class action lawsuit against BP, Transocean, Halliburton, and Cameron for their economic losses, alleging negligence and seeking both economic and punitive damages.

The State of Florida on May 10 announced it had assembled a legal team to file suit against BP. Then just 2 days after that, on May 12, the fishermen filed another such lawsuit in Mississippi, recognizing that, again, they have the ability to go after unlimited damages in those forums.

Again, I am open to raising the liability cap, but we have both a directive from the White House and the American people who, I believe, still support offshore drilling. We need to adjust these liability caps in a way that does not give the biggest oil companies a monopoly over the entire OCS.

Mr. President, I object to the unanimous consent request at this time.

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