the yeas are two hundred twenty and the nays are one eighty five the resolution is adopted without objection a motion to reconsider is laid on the table well members please clear the well please take your discussions off the floor for what purpose does the gentleman from california arrive speaker pursuant to house resolution six thirty seven i call up the conference report to accompany h r twenty six sixty nine the clerk will report the title of the bill and terry twenty six sixty nine a bill to provide for reconciliation pursuant to section sixty one of the concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year two thousand and eight pursuant to house resolution six thirty seven the conference report is considered read the gentleman from california mr miller and the gentleman from california mr mckeon will each control thirty minutes the chair recognizes the distinguished gentleman from california mr miller month the members please to take your discussions off of the floor gentleman from california is recognized madam speaker i rise in strong support of the conference report in h r twenty six sixty nine the college cost reduction access act legislation to provide for cutting the interest rates on subsidized student loans from six point eight percent to three point four percent over the next five years that calls for the biggest increase in the pell grant in the history of the program of a thousand almost a thousand new dollars over the next five years that provides for an income change a payment plan where people will not have to pay more than fifteen percent of their income on student loans and if they go to public service that loan can be forgiven for ten years and provides major support for the minority serving institutions of this of this country and this is all done within the pay go rules because this is twenty billion dollars in excessive subsidies that were being paid to the lenders in this field and we comply with the with the budget act the house is not in order now anders please be respectful and take your discussion outside and i yield the remainder of my time to the gentleman from south carolina mr spratt and the chairman of the budget committee gentlemen fr is also a happy occasion where good policy for education is also good for the budget bottom line this bill will reduce the budget deficit that's right it will reduce the budget deficit over five years seven hundred fifty million t fifty million dollars at the same time that it invests in human cut capital and makes college more affordable for millions of students i'm proud to see this outcome proud of got the ball rolling in the budget committee to start the process and i come in the chairman who has taken this bill from january to september passing it step by step through the house through the senate conference setting it in no small part due to the reconciliation status in jordan the senate and i hope that the is a product of both the flawed policy and a flawed process the conference report was made available to republicans for the first time less than twenty four hours before it reached the rules committee unfortunately that was just the latest in a series of disappointments we've endured throughout the process but perhaps my greatest disappointment in the is the sinking reality that this conference agreement could have done more to help low income students gain access to college instead i fear we have squandered a tremendous opportunity college cost reduction the name of this act really is not a part of this bill it's a huge spending bill there is one element of this conference report worthy of praise and i'd like to begin there this conference agreement will invest approximately eleven billion dollars in pell grants which i believe are the single most effective tool to help open the doors of higher education to low income students representative rick keller the senior republican of the subcommittee on higher education lifelong learning and competitiveness deserves great credit for the pell grant increases that have been provided over the last several years mr keller is a champion for the pell grant program having founded the congressional pell grant caucus to advocate for this critical program the recipient pell grant himself mr keller has shined a spotlight on the importance of targeting the federal investment in higher education to serve low income students if i had been in the room when this agreement was reached i would have preferred to invest even more in pell grants in fact i advocated a straightforward approach to reform that would have saved billions of dollars by making the student loan program more efficient and plow those resources directly in grants it's an approach that i continue to believe would have received strong bipartisan report support in both the house and the senate instead the democrats opted to jeopardize the stability of the federal financial education loan program by imposing excessive cuts created an unnecessary complex and cumbersome auction scheme that will deny parents a choice of loan providers impose an impossible timeline for implementation that set students up for confusion and program participants up for failure and created massive new entitlement programs i harbor serious concerns about this conference report when it is simply taken at face value unfortunately i fear that when we consider the long term ramifications these concerns grow much more serious first the conference report creates new entitlement programs but only provides short term funding every single person in this room knows that once created an entitlement will not die that means in five years we'll be forced to make additional cuts to fund these new entitlements second the conference report includes the misguided plan to temporarily reduce interest rates what once was a campaign promise has become a trap that will and snare either students or taxpayers and possibly both the plan would temporarily pays down interest rates over the next four years and just as soon as the rate gets down to  level it is today as democrats promised during the campaign it will jump back to its current level the choice then becomes whether we break the promise to students and allow the rates to rise or break the promise to taxpayers that this legislation is paid for and stick them with an age additional twenty to thirty billion dollars to pay for those cuts over the next five years the third consequence of this proposal which i believe the majority has not considered is the end to burden that will be caused by its hasty implementation the conference report presumes that complex technical logical and service charges will be implemented in a matter of weeks it seems almost inevitable that this unrealistic timeline will create chaos within these programs for students program participants and the department of education and finally let me be perfectly clear i have absolutely no confidence in the department of education's ability to implement the changes outlined in this conference report particularly with the timeline it sets it gives me no pleasure to point out this obvious fact particularly in a republican administration but it's true and sadly we will all be watching this failure play out in the weeks months and years ahead there's another issue that bears mentioning and it's what this conference report unfortunately does not do despite its lofty name this legislation does nothing at all to reduce the cost of college it didn't have to be this way in fact the bill that passed the house contained provisions that i've championed to make college cost increases more transparent to students and parents these commonsense reforms were stripped away leaving consumers with nothing the majority will tell you these college cost provisions were removed because they did not meet the stringent rules applied to a budget reconciliation package that may well be true if so i consider it further proof that by abusing the reconciliation process we missed key opportunities to help students while this conference agreement is unmistakably a product of the democratic congress i cannot help but express my disappointment in the administration for their role in this process the fiscal year two thousand and eight by jit request proposed excess of cuts to the student loan programs cuts that i believe may ultimately destabilize the largest source of federal financial assistance and when the bill left this house the administration promised to veto the bill if some of these agree just measures were left in the bill they are still there and i now understand the president will sign the bill this conference agreement makes a significant investment in the pell grant program for that i am appreciative i only wish it had done more i wish that we could have seized upon the opportunity to work together in a bipartisan fashion and produce a conference report that lived up to its name mr speaker i am madam speaker i am deeply disappointed in the conference report we are considering and the process that was used to get here so i must oppose final passage with that i reserve the balance of my time john in return the gentleman from california recognized you one minute to the gentleman from illinois mr emanuel who has worked very sixty years ago in an era where you earn what you learn this bill will ensure that more americans have access to a college education today the average student graduating from college graduates with one hundred thousand dollars of debt so on graduation day you get a diploma on one side and you get a one hundred thousand dollar bill on the other side and this legislation will ensure that more and more americans have the access to a college education not one of us would be here if it wasn't for the fact that we had access to a college education and ability to make something of ourselves this will ensure that middle class families their children do not suffer under the burden of the cost of rising costs of a college education i remember when i was running for office i met a family in porridge park in illinois in chicago illinois as a police officer for eleven years his wife was a teacher in parochial school they had two kids in high school and they looked at me on their doorstep and they had make a decision to have additional points  standards they had to make a decision a third job among them a second mortgage on their home or burdening their children with that one hundred thousand dollars of additional debt this legislation makes insurers that they are both good parents and their children have access to a great college education and again want to compliment the leadership from our my colleague me congressman miller for producing this legislation in such speedy time time is expired gentleman from california mr mckeon is recognized  doesn't control to ition costs this is a fundamental disagreement about the direction of our government do we believe in markets or do we believe in the federal government this is a remnant of the battle where we move from direct lending over to free market lending that this bill in fact does not does nothing to control costs inevitably it will lead to the government taking over and direct lending in government having to try to fix a class of lending and then to fix the two issue and cost because there's nothing in here that balances to ition costs previously students and parents if they had to factor in rising tuition costs and they couldn't get affordable loans the pressure of the market would come on universities and colleges and an alternative forms and the market would respond but this bill releases the market pressure for the more in this bill there are other things that instead of putting the money for those students who are highest risk in in have the least income and pell grants we've expanded into the middle class where the only hopeful pressure for tuition costs would come from we students who could achieve academic scholarship in most universities can get into the highest universities if they can achieve the scholarship levels let's look at this debate we're  really is it it's in the middle class it's about does the private sector manage loans better than the public sector and how does that a triangle work with the universities for example under private sector lending bad debts have gone down why because you get financial conflict there is a private sector incentive to make a profit that results in conflict of saying will your degree match up your ability to repay or we won't give you the loan they also put the pressure on the institutions even with a small portion of the student loan being actual private sector but there's a provision in this bill and i don't use this in a pejorative term i use it in actual dictionary term is the most socialist provision that i have seen in a bill and it's the income based repayment plan the income base plan says that you only take fifteen percent of your income of your discretionary income to repay the interest which then gets capitalized into the capital let me use my own personal example my father and we came from a nice middle class family but middle class at best in retailing my dad told me he would either pay my way through grad school or undergrad if i wanted to go to grad school the college of my choice he had saved a certain amount of money i would have to live at home and go undergraduate i got a great education at indiana pretty university in fort wayne and then went to the university of notre dame my father would have had no incentive under this bill to do so because in furniture retailing followed by being a congressional staffer i did not make enough money that i could have repaid my loan to notre dame or my undergraduate loan and i would have had that loan excuse that twenty five years i would have never paid a probably based on my salary based on inflation adjustment not a dime on the principle there would have been no lark management on my dad to save the money or on me undermining both the lending promise of the private sector and the personal responsibility of parents and students to balance this is a purist government takeover of a project that will not reduce the cost of student loans but will expand the power of government and the inefficiency the government and ultimately damage students of america no matter how good and tempting it sounds about what the campaign commercials sound like it is a terrible terrible bill down in from california is recognized i yield one and a half minutes to the remarks and to submit extraneous material for the record without objection madam speaker i strongly urge all of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support this conference report today the payoff for investing in education is even greater and the stakes are higher the college cost reduction and access act will open the doors of higher it to a new generation of students this is our moment to take a stand for our future competitiveness and prosperity investment in pell grants hissing crees significantly it supports college success success for first generation low income students by dedicating additional resources to upward bound and college access challenge grants it invests in our public servants and in our teachers i am particularly proud of our work to strengthen the institutions that are the gateway of access to higher ed for minority students through this legislation we will increase funding over several years by five hundred ten million dollars in h s size h b c u's tribal colleges native hawaiian institutions and newly designated predominately black institutions as well as institutions serving asian americans i commend chairman miller senator kennedy and all my house colleagues on both sides of the aisle on me education and labor committee for their hard work and leadership  crafting the college cost reduction and access act it has been my privilege to work on this legislation and this conference report has already been passed in the senate and i'm very happy about that i urge my colleagues to support this conference thank my colleagues for her yielding you know i come to the floor today opposed to this bill this budget reconciliation conference report before us today creates five new title programs in abuses the protection of the reconciliation procedures a number of programs that were part of discretionary spending that depended as to whether the money was available in the budget or not and whether we had the money available to fund those programs determined exactly how much money would be spent on those programs but now they will be moved into entitlement status more money rather than going through a process where we review the spending every year is on automatic pilot and sure the bill says that these programs will sunset but those of us that have been here for a while that know that entitlement programs never sunset they just grow larger and larger and larger in the federal government and this congress loses control over that spending the discussion about the student loan interest cutting it in half it goes down and scales down over a period of four or five years and in five the fifth year comes back to its full amount why because we can't afford it or the other side hasn't been able to find the twenty to thirty billion dollars that's estimated would actually be necessary to continue this program in the past will they find it in the future probably it will be called deficit spending this bill is a massive attack on the private sector significant increases in new federal mandatory spending it grows government one more time it puts the got federal government in control of more parts of the education sector the education process squeezing out the private sector squeezing out parents and inserting big brother and big government in the process but under this administration when it comes to education why am i not not surprised that we're talking about more government and less parental involvement with that i yield back the balance of my time gentleman from california m i thank you congratulate my chairman and friend for this excellent piece of work you know when middle class people and police officers and real estate agents can skew to programmers sit down to fill out the forms at the kitchen table to apply for financial aid they end the process very frustrated because they quickly conclude there's nothing in there for them after hours and hours of putting their tax returns forward filling out forms there's nothing in the financial aid laws for middle class people that's the way people feel this bill changes that for the first time in a long time there is a to middle class students under this bill and here's the way it works when your son or daughter borrow money and we wish there was less borrowing and more scholarships but the reality is given the fiscal constraints we have there's going to be borrowing when your son or daughter borrows money their repayment of that loan will rise as their income does so when they're new they have their first apartment their first car payment other issues in their life their payments will be low but as their incomes rise their payments will rise to pay their loans back this is a loan repayment program that works the way life does you start out with a low income and a lot of obligations and hopefully your income grows when it does your payments too but if it doesn't then your payments stay reasonable this is the way life works this is the way the student loan program on a work i commend the chairman was leadership in making this happen and urged a yes vote for this bill men from california mr mckeon is recognized happy to yield to the gentleman from georgia a member of the committee three minutes mr price gentleman is recognized for three minutes you madam speaker and i thank my good friend california for his wonderful and diligent work in this area an area that we ought to have had a bipartisan bill but this bill is an interesting and a curious work product of this house one that will be i believe troubling to the nation what the democrat majority has done has brought together the ingredients for in a huge recipe for bad policy so far the new majority has kept the republicans out of the process not a single house republican not one was involved in the conference committee report or signed it they have manipulated the recommendations of the administration to serve their altieri or motives and they have disregarded input from key stakeholders and students and parents across this nation as a result of this recipe the congress has a final product that distorts the reconciliation and puts at risk expanding college access for students over the long term we predicted during the debate of the budget resolution that the quote savings quote savings in the reconciliation process were a fig leaf and today the house is debating a bill which spends nearly twenty two billion dollars more in new entitlement spending just to get seven hundred and fifty million dollars in savings as fuzzy math madam speaker fact entitlement growth automatic spending is unsustainable and consumes more than half the entire federal budget it's also a fact that if left on autopilot by twenty thirty that automatic spending will consume the end tire federal budget without true spending reform entitlements will eventually crowd out all other spending and this bill h r twenty six sixty nine makes a major mistake of magnifying the problem by adding new entitlement monies in fact the conference agreement dedicates one point one seven billion dollars to new automatic spending programs at a time of runaway spending the democrat majority is intent on creating these massive new spending programs instead of dedicating the savings to deficit reduction such an approach continues us down the path of fiscal irresponsibility now all that might be ok madam speaker if if the changes offered would truly help students but they don't the democrats have decided to favor a washington run bureaucrat student lending system rather than a flexible responsive free market alternative this bill cuts over twenty two billion dollars in the federal family education loan program the only conceivable reason to do that is to paralyze it and to put it at a disadvantage to the direct government loan program or washington run program this is unfortunate because that federal family education loan program has proven mar far more successful does a better job of providing student loans and this is reflected in the fact that for nearly every government loan there are for loans by the federal family education loan in the end democrats want to cripple this program because they favor a centralized governmental approach to this nation's challenges all these drastic cuts do is put at risk the need of support students and the access that they will have to a college education overtime for these reasons i strongly urge my colleagues t in and express my disappointment at having to oppose the gentleman's bill i know members on both sides of the aisle have worked hard over the last few years including efforts on my own behalf as when i was chairman the education workforce committee to help make college more affordable for more of america's students you know most of us wouldn't be here had it not been for a chance at a at a decent education and a college education to allow us the opportunity to be all that we can be here in america and i think all of us agree that we want these the these opportunities for all students and that's why eighteen months ago when  benefits for students low income students who would enter into an agreement to study math and science at four year institutions i thought was a sound bill and we made sound efforts when i look at the bill before us there are a number of concerns that i have first is that the cuts to the private sector loan program that are that are involved in this bill i think will cripple the private sector  loan program and when you look at what the private sector has brought to the students and their parents across the country they've brought a lot of innovation they've they've brought new ideas new techniques to help more students and their families be able to afford a college education and a cripple that in my view is an effort to drive more of those families and students to the direct loan program this government run program that in my view is misguided i didn't support it as that my friend from california well knows didn't support it when it happened sums up sixteen years ago and as we look at the direct loan program it looks like a government run program with very few benefits for students and clearly not very a cost effective as well and so that's my first concern my second concern is that we all around here over the seventeen years that i've been here pledge fiscal responsibility and we've got to be careful about how we spend the taxpayers funds and when we look at the bill before us we create five new entitlement programs these are the programs that get put on automatic pilot and if and while they may be paid for here in the first four or five years as some of the provisions in this bill will cost ten to twenty billion dollars over the next ten years that's not paid for and that's according to they see below and while while we pledge fiscal responsibility at the end the day we have to stand up and do it you know the american people sent us here to make decisions on their behalf and fiscal decisions on their behalf and we have to make those real decisions but when you look at the long term cost of this program i think it's not paid for is fiscally irresponsible and at a time when we're trying to balance the federal  and putting this bill together there's no surprise to he nor i that we would decide three about the benefits of this bill you know he sees this glass as half full i see it as half empty and i really see  it empty when it comes to the issue of being fiscally responsible and standing up to do the right things that the american people sent us here to do so i would ask my colleagues these are the hard decisions well meaning bill well meanin well intentioned but long term i think is a real mistake for students and taxpayers here in america gentleman from california mr miller's recognize john reserves gentleman from california mr mckeon recognize happy deal now to the gentleman from utah member of the committee mr bishop three minutes gentleman is recognized the minute i thank the ranking member from california m speaker i stand i guess to oppose the reconciliation bill that doesn't reconcile much in this particular bill it encourages direct loan programs programs that are paid for and controlled by the federal government and whether intentionally or not a tax discourages programs like felt which are public private partnerships where the government actually provides the funds but they are not administered by the government in a clumsy way of verbiage by lumping not for profit programs and not for profit program lenders in the same category as for profit lenders it creates an unintended consequences consequence that does harm just college students in my state my state has a higher education authority program it's not for profit program administered by the state that provides students who have had loans under this program with deduction so one of the quarter percent automatic deduction if you have automatic payment program it's a two percent reduction on the rate if after forty eight consecutive payments have been on time which means for a kid in this a gram on a standard fifteen thousand dollars stafford loan he could actually say two thousand dollars over the cost that loan and over what would happen in a direct payment program perhaps i'm a little bit sensitive this because i still have four kids in college and i know what the expense of college actually means but in this reconciliation bill by lumping the not for profit programs with profit programs the margins that they have in this not for profit programs are so small that these deductions will no longer be available if indeed the program can survive by itself it will force students in my state either to pay the full government rates without any deductions or go to a full rate of a profit for profit lenders i know the intention of this bill is not hurt kids the intention this bill is perhaps a red felt programs but in so doing it actually does hurt real kids who happen to graham's right now or who may be having programs in the near future oftentimes when the people around in education we have unintended consequences that our actions here because it's such a gross level have unintended consequences of actually hurting real life people this bill does that not intentionally but it still does that it would have been far better for us to do the program in the ranking member was always talking about encouraging and expanding telegrams that would do more to help kids than all the other restructuring we're doing in this particular reconciliation bill and for those reasons because it does hurt kids in my state i have to oppose this reconciliation bill and i yield back whatever time i may have been from california mr miller reserves this time gentleman from california so we can but as the time gentlemen from california has ten and a half minutes and gentleman from california has twenty three and three quarters you know what the speakers are going to do it all a wonderful state i went to college there i like it a lot but wisconsin's god's country madam speaker i rise in opposition to this bill and i choose my words carefully when i say this but this bill really in my opinion is a cynical attempt to make a campaign promise good what i mean when i say that is three things number one in the guise of budget reconciliation the reason this bill is here so quickly to the floor through conference so fast out of the other body is they brought it to the floor through budget reconciliation what is budget reconciliation it's a way of reducing the deficit seven hundred fifty two million dollars of savings for over twenty billion dollars of spending that's a cynical attempt to exploit the budget deficit reduction process to create a brand new government program and an avalanche of new spending why else is it cynical it cut student rates in half for six months and then it doubles  six months later to try and shoehorn this bill into compliance with the majority's pay go to try and say that they're paying for this bill they give student graduates non students graduates a cut in their interest rate for six months and half then double it six months later it also cynically creates five new entitlement programs what are entitlement programs entitlement programs or spending programs that go on autopilot it has sunsets in these programs but madam speaker the most permanent thing in washington is a temporary government program a special a temporary entitlement program take all this together and assume that congress down the road will not eliminate these five new entitlement programs established assume they won't just cut interest rates for graduates for only six months but for longer and you've got another twenty to thirty billion dollars of spending out the door and lastly madam speaker this takes from the private sector and gives the government this puts on to the taxpayers liability these liabilities this says instead of private firms that are out there processing loans right now that work really well my student loans came from these sources this says no we want the taxpayer to bear the burden we want the taxpayer to be on the hook for these loans if they default look we have problems with with loans all over we have this this meltdown in the mortgage markets with sub prime loans and we're saying now in congress let's put more liability on the taxpayer books if it ain't broken don't fix it we have a system that works well with a system that helps students this bill does nothing to address the high cost of tuition it cynically attempts to make it appear as though it makes borrowing a little less expensive for people after they graduate and then it doubles the interest rates six months later for all of those freedoms reasons madam speaker the abuse of the budget reconciliation process the increase of pacs pay or liability and the creation irresponsibly of five new entitlement programs when three current only programs right now are bringing us into a mountain of debt a mountain of of legacy of debt to our children grandchildren the gentleman from florida the subcommittee ranking member on the higher education portion of the education committee mr keller three minutes gentleman is recognized for three minutes i thank the before the change in congress that i still have the honor of serving as the chairman and founder of the pell grant caucus pell grants are money we give to children from low and moderate income families to help them go to college i myself would not have been able to go to college if it wasn't for pell grants pell grants are truly the passport out of poverty for many worthy young people we believe in a bipartisan manner that all children rich or poor deserve the opportunity to go to college the pell grants when this college cost reduction act was initially presented in the house i felt that it spent too much money on new entitlement programs and too little on for example it had an increase of five point eight billion dollars i was honored to serve on the conference committee i made those comments during our conference committee and the conference committee decided to increase the pell grant funding from five point eight billion to eleven point four billion doubling what was in the original house bill what does that mean for young people going to college that means the maximum award is now going to go from four thousand three hundred ten dollars to fifty four hundred dollars phased in over time whatever one may think of the rest of the provisions pro or con i have to tell you that is an outstanding provision in terms of a pell grant increase now some of my republican colleagues may say that we're investing several billion dollars in pell grants and is that a wise use of money i can tell you that these pell grant increase this is pay for themselves the nonpartisan advisory committee on student financial assistance said that by investing thirteen billion dollars in pell grants it helps yelled up to eighty five billion dollars in additional tax revenue the reason is the average college graduate makes seventy five percent more than the average high school graduate so it's good for the treasury it's good for our young people and it's good for employment rates in this country i want to congratulate and thank congressman miller congressman dana hosa and congressman mckeon for all their work and substantially grants those provisions make it much easier for young people to be able to go to college mr speaker i yield back the balance of my time gentleman from california mr miller missouri this time gentleman from california m mccann and then the time again five minutes remaining gentleman from california twenty three and three quarters from mr miller jonathan californias or is there any way we could prevail upon the chairman to give us one or two of your twenty three and a half minutes under very strict guidelines or from the leadership just two minutes what about if we could unanimous consent we  get two extra minutes i'd love to hear you i don't want to buy i don't want i'm not going to use my time so i'm under very strict kind of confines here with my leadership i've asked members of my committee not to speak so i can't be yielding time when i didn't give it to the members of my committee i'm sorry carolina number the committee miss fox two minutes gentleman's recognized for two minutes thank you mr chairman mr ranking member of the committee this bill does absolutely nothing to improve access to a college education it's a sham it's another move toward socialism and taking away personal responsibility in our country you know i probably have the most experience in this area of anybody in the memory in congress i worked my way through college through an undergraduate doctoral programs without and any loans whatsoever it can be done it is not necessary for people to borrow nineteen thousand dollars a year to go to college or come out with that kind of a debt i've served in the field of education i've been a school board member higher education ministration directed upward bound special services programs and i know what it's like to have to be operating these programs we have absolutely no accountability in the programs that we are passing here and we need to be doing that the american people want significant and strong education but they do not want to see is wasting money like we are wasting here this is called the college cost reduction act it does absolutely nothing to reduce the cost of going to college but it starts out on the long list of complex new entitlement programs and my colleagues have spoken very very eloquently about that we still are going to have college students stuck with college costs that are going up every week because the federal government is involved we're doing nothing to help the federal work study program which has been one of the most successful programs that the federal government has ever gotten into actually can support a bill that raises the cost of going to college instead of lowering the cost of going to college this is going to and make it even more  complicated to do financial aid regulations even though we're reducing the size of the form what we need is a workable federal financial aid system that hell students get a high quality education but this we're trying to sell to the american people but they've done a good job because evidently they have sold this to the administration and i want to say madam speaker i am totally disappointed in the administration that they have bought all this bill of goods this is nothing but a sham i'm from the state of georgia where we instituted the hope scholarship program which worked out great for students but what ended up happening is the colleges continued to went go up on their tuition costing the taxpayers more and more money because it was not a competitive market anymore that's what we're fixing it into to colleges universities all across this country and take in the private industry out of this making them responsible for the loans it's going to put the doubt you have just one week madam speaker we've i think heard some very good things about this bill i've been on this committee now for fifteen years since i came to congress i've had great concerns about people that are not able are not able to go to college we've seen statistics that show that forty eight percent of young people from lower income families are not able to attend college because of the cost of college i have introduced legislation i've done what i could to try to reduce the cost of college this bill is called a cost reduction act it does nothing to reduce the cost of college it gives money to schools which we haven't done in the past we've given the money to individual students and let them pick the school that they've gone on to it does increase the money the pell grants and i appreciate that during the time that i was the higher education subcommittee in the time i have with the we've been in the majority we've doubled the money going into pell grants and we have a million and a half students now more that are receiving pell grants and before and that's good but the th about this bill that that really bothers me i guess is the promise it holds out to students that they're never going to receive reminds me of a t v contest game contests that i've seen in the past it showed three court curtains or three doors and and you tried to pick the door that had the great prize and my concern is that that these students are going to start school with the idea that their interest is going to be cheaper four years five years from now when they graduate and they're going to find that it's not there's a promise there when they open that door they're going to find a huge tax burden you're going to find huge loan burdens and what we should be working on in a cost reduction bill is something that actually addresses what we can do to lower the cost of of a college education not what it costs not the loan interest what we should really be trying to do is is address the core problem the cost of college costs has been going up four times faster than people's ability to pay for the last twenty years we should be addressing that problem we should oppose this b time gentleman from california mr miller is recognized and a speaker i would like to thank the chairman of our subcommittee reuben and a host and all of the members of the conference committee and  for their valuable contributions to this to this legislation i would also like to thank chairman spratt who spoke earlier for providing the reconciliation process and all of the work that their staff did to make sure that we complied with the i would also like to thank senator kennedy and senator enzi for their help and and their staffs work with us to have a successful conference and a conference report on this act and i'd like to thank the education labor committee and just in humphrey and the congressional research service has been equally support of our efforts in particular adam stole charmaine mercer david smally becky skinner and jeff koons e i want to thank all of these individuals and certainly i want to thank the students who for so many years have tried to get the congress to respond to their needs and to the needs of their families that they have to borrow money to go to school to go to school and to achieve a higher education achieve the education that that that that provides i certainly want to thank us student and then state students association and many others who work so hard over the over these past years we remember just a year ago just a year ago we were here in the reconciliation process when eleven point nine billion dollars was taken out of this very same account but rather than to use it for the benefit of the students that eleven point nine billion dollars went to pay for the tax cuts to the wealthiest people in this country we took eleven point three nine billion dollars out of this same account and we gave that to the pell grants students the most needy students in this country who need it the most that the difference that an election makes that's the difference that a year makes that's the difference that a lot of hard work by the students across this country and their families have made as they've asked members of congress to address this to address this issue this legislation just earlier today passed in the senate by an overwhelming bipartisan vote of seventy nine to twelve it is now been stated that the president united states supports this legislation and will sign this legislation i would hope that all of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle would understand the importance of this legislation the value of this legislation to our students and to their families as we know so many of them struggle to put together the means by which they can pay for the college education of their students one of the very great moments of an of the very great moments in a parent's life is when their students get accepted to college students and now they want to go to college and then you immediately start to think about how are we going to pay for this this legislation will make it a lot easier for a lot of parents and a lot of students who desperately need this help i ask all of my colleagues to support the conference report and let's join this bipartisan coalition and help america's families and students and i yield back the balance of my time and i thank everybody for their cooperation without objection the previous question is ordered the question is on the adoption of the conference report all those in favor say aye those opposed no in the pin in the chair the eyes have it and that's what the conference report is agreed to with and without objection on that i ask for a rule twenty four the procedure to this question are postpone house on the state of the union for the consideration of h r nineteen zero eight which the clerk will report by title a bill to entitle thirty eight united states code to provide for patent reform  pursuant to the rule of the bill is considered read the first time the gentleman from michigan mr conyers and the gentleman from texas mr smith each will control thirty minutes the chair will now recognize the gentleman from michigan members of the house i'm proud and privileged to be the chairman of judiciary committee for this historic consideration of the patent reform two thousand and seven i can't help but begin by commending those members of judiciary who were in this battle before i became chairman  namely lamar smith of texas namely howard berman of california namely mr coble of north carolina who have worked in an remarkable way even when the leadership changed in the committees and smith became ranking and berman became chair the cooperation and bipartisanship continued i i think i think it's important to lay that groundwork because of the in tense cooperation in which we've sought to consult with every conceivable organization individual  stakeholders in this matter and it's i think had a very telling effect on a bill that brings us all together here this afternoon after all patent reform is in shrine in the constitution isn't it article one section eight after all we've had a patent office pursuant to constitutional direction since seventeen ninety so for a couple hundred years this has been the driving force for american competition creativity inventiveness and  prosperous economy thomas jefferson was the first patent examiner in an our american history and so i'm concept is very important it has been estimated that the value of intellectual property in the united states amounts to five trillion dollars and much of that is in the value of the patents that come from the legislation produced by this bill well if it's so great why are we here well because certain things have happened over the course of years that need some reexamination one one of them is the the charcoal ing situation in which patents of less than high quality are now being well they've created a whole legal industry as some will continue to describe here nuisance value they flood the courts with unnecessary litigation their abusive practices that have grown up around the concept of  sometimes they go against the grain or to the detriment of the the rest of of the people the stakeholders and in this great  patents and so i'm here to tell you that we finally close the circle that the latest and i'm proud of this being from  a highly organized state of michigan that with our friends and labor we've been able to work out differences that they had originally had with this measure all the consumer groups there are several of them that have now joined with us the united states public interest research group has come in  the pharmaceuticals have mostly come in the association of small inventors have come in we've done a great job and we've  created a manager's amendment to which we've allotted twenty minutes to discuss separately from the bill itself i'm i'm proud as you can tell of bipartisan nature of this work because that's what it takes to make some twenty two changes in the manager's amendment more than two dozen changes in the underlying bill and dealing with the question of damages in post grant position are stories that only can be told by the gentleman from california with his appropriate brevity and so it's in that spirit that we began this final discussion of this measure i thank all the members of the congress not on the strongly endorse h r one thousand no eight the patent reform act of two thousand and seven and i urge my colleagues to support american inventors american businesses and the american people by voting for this bill today last year we laid a substantial foundation for patent reform it was a good start but we need to finish the job now the patent reform act is the most significant and comprehensive update to patent law since the one nine hundred fifty two act was  d the judiciary committee has undertaken such an initiative because changes to the patent system are necessary to bolster the u s economy and improve the quality of living for all americans there are two major reasons the committee wrote the bill first too many patents of questionable integrity have been approved second holders of these weak patents discovered a novel way to make money not by commercializing the pattens but by suing matter factory companies whose operations might incorporate the pattens this combination of weak patents and seat of the patents litigation has hurt the economy most companies don't want to risk shutting down their operations in response to a questionable lawsuit nor do they have much faith in a legal system in which juries and even judges become confused by the complexities of patent law the result legalized extortion in which companies pay a lot of money to use suspect patterns the bill will eliminate legal gamesmanship from the current system that rewards lawsuit abuses it will enhance the quality of patents and increase public confidence and their legal integrity this will help individuals and companies obtain money for research commercialize their inventions expand their businesses create new jobs and offer the american people a dazzling array of products and services that continue to make our country the envy of the world all businesses small and large will benefit all industries directly or indirectly affected by patents including finance automotive manufacturing high tech and pharmaceuticals will profit given the scope of eight it is impossible to satisfy completely every interested party but the committee has made many concessions to accommodate many individuals and many businesses the bill has not been rushed through the process over the past three years our committee has conducted ten hearings with more than forty witnesses representing a broad range of interests and views the patent reform act was amended it different stages of the process to address criticisms of the bill still not all interest have endorsed the bill i think their response is mostly a resistance to change any change this bill is not intended to favor the interest of one group over another it does correct glaring inequities that encourage individuals to be less inventive and more litigious supporters of the bill run the educational consumer and business spectrum the business software alliance the information technology in your street council the american association of universities the american bankers association the consumer federation of america the computer and communications industry association and the financial services round table again they all endorsed this bill article one section eight as the chairman mentioned a while ago that the constitution empowers congress quote to promote the progress of science and the useful arts by securing for limited times to arthurs and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries and quote the foresight of the founders in creating an intellectual property system demonstrates their understanding of how patent rights ultimately benefit the american people nor was the value of patents lost in one of our greatest presidents abraham lincoln himself a patent owner lincoln described the patent system as adding quote the fuel of interest to the fire of genius and quote few issues are as important to the economic strength of the united states as our ability to create and protect an electoral property american ip industries account for over half of all u s exports represent forty percent of the country's economic growth and employ eighteen million americans a recent study valued u s intellectual property at five trillion dollars or about half of the u s gross domestic product the patent reform act represents a major improvement to our patent system that will benefit americans for years to come madam chair this bill has been a bipartisan effort we would not be here now without the steady hand and gentle suggestions made by our chairman mr conyers i also want to acknowledge the indispensable contributions congressman howard berman and congressman howard coble among others all three of us have been chairman of the intellectual property subcommittee over the past number of years and we have worked together on developing this bill but it is mr good fortune and a testament to his legislative ability that we are on the house floor today and i congratulate him for that achievement madam chair out reserve the balance of my time as are gentlemen from michigan now well known by all of the house and i'm pleased to you at this time two minutes gentlemen from california is recognized for two minutes thank you madam chair and  first i have to say we wouldn't be here not only for his substantive contributions to this legislation but because of his suggestions about the approach we should take whether it was in full committee or as we move towards the floor in terms of working out problems that existed and that's chairman conyers he played a critical role in getting us to this point lamar howard  indispensable they made incredible contributions this is really complicated stuff but the question is why why are we doing this and here are the things we are told by groups like the national academy of sciences and so many other organizations that are tremendously respected for their understanding of science and of our economy one there are serious problems in the patent system too many poor quality patents have been issued which cheapen the value of patents generally three there have been variety of of view abuses in patent litigation rules that have taken valuable resources away from research and  innovation for u s based businesses are disadvantaged because our patent laws aren't harmonized with the rest of the world many organizations many groups have argued for these reforms a quick statement about support every major consumer group in this country has indorsed this legislation there is tremendous some art in the financial services sector in the high technology sector the universities have now university of california which is one of the critical magnets of research and development have supported pouched passage of this legislation the american a so the association american association of universities is supporti not fully dealt with and that particularly relates to the issue of damages and the apportionment of damages it is our commitment my commitment the chairman's commitment mr smith's commitment mr cupples commitment to work with people who are concerned about that  g language to reach an appropriate middle ground the reforms the way damages are calculated between now and the conference committee and the conference committee and when this comes back to deal with that controversy i urge strong votes and strong and i'm sure you will five mr my friend from north carolina mr coble the ranking member and former chairman of the intellectual property subcommittee gentlemen recognize a fine i think that my friend from texas feeling madam speaker i recall some years ago  we were discussing a path proposed patent legislation before crowded here it grew and i remember one member saying to the to the crowd he said i have friends for this bill i have friends opposed to this bill the patent office independent within the department of commerce among other things and as our domestic economy becomes increasingly dependent on the global economy about us maker so too does our patent system other challenges stem from the marketplace as our domestic economy becomes increasingly dependent on the global economy so does the patent system and many international markets patent protection is one certainty on which american manufacturers can rely when they are trying to compete internationally h r nineteen a way to addresses these challenges in several respects first the bill implements first to file patent system which is in the line with other countries and w been possible hope that after today we will continue to pursue compromise so that with some good fortune we may convince all stakeholders to support what i believe is needed patent reform and i say to the gentleman from texas i thank you for having persistent work that he has performed and bringing this measure to the house floor today mr berman and i introduced an earlier version of this patent reform fully five years ago and building on that early effort mr berman has worked tirelessly to build broad support for the patent reform support externally and bipartisan support in this chamber to fine tune the bills provisions and to obtain judiciary committee approval of the measure earlier this year that is truly an impressive accomplishment there is an urgent need to improve the patent system patent examiners are burdened with many applications and are are encouraged to move quickly on each one of them and as they do their work they are isolated from an important source of highly relevant information that information sources the knowledge that individuals may have that the work that is the subject of the patent application may in fact not be original that someone else in fact may have invented that particular object and that that object has been in use prior to the time that the application  that information we called prior art and the existing patent process contains no avenue for third parties who may possess information about prior art to submit that to the patent examiner while the application is being examined our reform bill corrects that flaw and in so doing will broadly operate to improve patent quality also in aid of patent quality is the provision which significantly strengthened the post grants enter parties reexamination process through which the patent office can be required to take a more careful look at the patent and the application that accompanies it before that patent is issued and final fo by the patent office our goal with this provision is to assure that before a patent is issued parties who contest its validity will have a full and complete opportunity to do so within the confines of the patent office itself and that improve the quality of patents adjust x aspects of the litigation process to the benefit of patent holders and those who license for use patented items and i strongly encourage pass the gist of the bill the bill i strongly encourage that the bill with that amendment in its text be approved technological creators and strengthening the hand of foreign and domestic the xp and scavengers who would exploit america's most creative minds and use our technology against us it would be a disaster for inventors with an impressive coalition strongly opposing this legislation universities labor unions biotech industries pharmaceuticals nanotech small business traditional manufacturers electronics and computer engine ears as well of course the patent examiners themselves were telling us this will have a horrible impact on our patent system they are all begging us to vote no this so called reform will make them vulnerable to theft by foreign and domestic technology thieves our most cutting edge technology will be available to our enemies and our competitors that's why i call this the steal american technologies act the billionaires in the electronics industry in the financial industries who are supporting h r one thousand nine hundred eight many of them already have built their factories in china would do away with the patent system altogether if they could they are so powerful and arrogant that they've set out to fundamentally alter our traditional technology protection laws laws that have served america well for over two hundred years yes this is an issue vital to the well being of the american people to our standard of living ye we find ourselves with a severely limited debate there's only one hour of debate those of us who are opposing this legislation haven't even been given the right which is traditional this body to control our own time yes this is this the way we're handling this debate is a disgrace without me twelve minutes of a little for those of us who oppose a bill that they claim is so important for the future of our country what do we know about this bill it is a horror story for american inventors and a windfall to foreign and domestic thieves we don't even know what's in the bill the manager's amendment has been changed even after the committee did its business so it wasn't even fully debated in committee and much less fully debated at the subcommittee level know what we're doing is a power play here and that's what we're witnessing we don't even the opposition doesn't even get the chance to argue our case adequately before this body or before the american people are inventors and our innovators are begging us not to pass this legislation foreign and domestic technology thieves are licking their chops let's not let the big guys beat down and smash the little guys which is what the purpose of this legislation is there are problems in the patent office that is true that can be created i mean that can be fixed without having to fundamentally alter the principles that are the basis of our patent system which is what this legislation does this legislation in the name of reform is being used as a cover to basic lee destroy the patent system that has served us so well in the long term it will destroy american competitiveness and the standard of living of  working people that's what's at stake here overseas that people in india and china and japan and korea are waiting there we have quotes from newspapers suggesting that as soon as this bill passes they'll have a greater ability to take american technology even before a patent is granted and put it into a commercial use against us this is a shameful shameful proposal the american people have a right to know we're watching out for their interests and i don't care what the billionaires in the fall and the electronics industry in the financial industry say we should have had more debate on this we should have had two or three hours debate on this if it's as important as they say instead we've been muzzled and it's a power grab vote against one te letters from the a f l see i own the university community the major centers of innovation and research in this country that directly contradict his assertion that they are opposed to the passage of this bill the members of this body should understand that passed and sent to the president a comprehensive innovation legislation that allowed america to maintain its lead in the area of technology and investment in the r and d of the come this country with this legislation the patent reform we're taking the second step and ensuring that america american companies and america's innovation maintains its leadership in the world in the companies that are producing the jobs and well paying manufacturing jobs here in this country i have micron company and other companies just to read one law sense of what they're saying as a company with several thousand patents cisco believes deeply in strong protection for intellectual pop property and fortune as you found during the hearing there are clear signs the current patent system is not bucking these reforms will allow us this is from mr chambers the chairman and c e o of cisco these reforms your govt debating today this legislation will allow us to continue to innovat help maintain our nation's position as the tech world's technology leader this is essential legislation for american companies america's innovation and its ability to produce jobs for the future major o s from major companies that have good maintained m a and also built america's leadership in the high tech field all support this legislation in addition to leaders of every major consumer group so it is both good for consumers and good for business and good for the companies that are producing the jobs here in this country and i'd like to submit into the record these letters from others just sort of the companies that support this legislation because of let because of what we're doing to maintain america's leadership in the produce and the production of new jobs new technology new companies here in this country there's a whole ways of doing that the formation of new capital venture capital funding e this though is the most important step to ensure that when people invent things and design patents that they have the notion in the pretty that those patents and their ideas are going to be protected and today we are taking a major step forward as these c e o s have s in their own letters in maintaining america's leadership in the production of new companies not only new companies but the most innovative jobs high paying jobs that are the future of this country and i want to commend the leadership for producing this legislation and having it on the floor today for a vote the gentlemen's request is that met additional materials that have to be considered in the full house gentleman from texas and i'm sure i you know four minutes to my friend from virginia mr goodlatte the ranking member of the agriculture committee the chairman of the house high caucus and a senior member of the judiciary committee gentleman from virginia is recognized to form and i thank the gentleman and i thank him for his leadership on the judiciary committee years of leadership on this legislation along with howard berman the chairman of the ip sub committee and their staffs for this legislation madam chairman article one section eight of our constitution lays the framework for our nation's patent laws it grants congress the power to award inventors for limited periods of time exclusive rights to their inventions the framers had the incredible foresight to realize that this type of incentive was crucial to ensure that america would become the world's leader in innovation and creativity these incentives are just as important today as they were at the founding of our country it is only right that as more and more inventions with increasing complexity emerge we should examine our nation's patent laws to ensure that they still work efficiently and that they still in courage and not discourage innovation so the america will remain the world's leader in innovation the solution involves both ensuring that quality patents are issued in the first place and ensuring that we take a good hard look at patent litigation enforcement laws to make sure that they do not contain loopholes for opportunists with invalid claims to exploit a h r one thousand nine hundred eight addresses both of these concerns first the bill helps ensure that quality patents are being issued by the s patent and trademark office the p t o like any other large government agency makes mistakes h r one thousand nine hundred eight creates a post grant opposition procedure to allow the private sector to challenge a patent just after it is approved to provide an additional check on the issuance of bogus patent better quality patents mean more certainty and less litigation for patent holders and businesses in addition h r one hundred eight contains important litigation reforms to rein in abusive lawsuits and forum shopping so that aggressive trial lawyers do not make patent litigation their next goldmine like they did for us bestest lawsuits class action lawsuits and the like specifically the bill tightens the venue provisions in the current patent law to prevent forum shopping h r one thousand nine hundred eight also prohibits excessive damage awards believe it or not there is no current requirement that damage awards in patent cases be limited to the value of the patent added the value that the patent added to the overall product the courts have created a virtual free for all environment in this area h r one thousand nine hundred eight contains provisions to help ensure that damages are proportional to the value of the invention added to the product which will inject certainty into this area of litigation and allow businesses to devote their resources to r and d and innovating the bill also creates clearer standards for willful infringement by requiring greater specificity in notice letters alleging infringement of patent claims and requiring courts to include in the record more information about how they calculate damage awards furthermore the bill contains an important amendment that congressman boucher and i added during the judiciary committee markup to prevent individuals and companies from filing patents to protect tax strategies since one thousand nine hundred eight when the federal circuit court of appeals held that business methods were patentable fifty one tax strategy patents have been granted covering such topics as a state and gift tax strategies pension plans charitable giving and the like over eighty additional tax strategy patents are pending before the us p t o when one individual or business is given the exclusive right to a particular method of complying with the tax code it increases the cost and complexity for every other citizen or tax preparer to comply with the tax code no one should have to pay royalties to file their taxes h r nine hundred eight renders these tax strategy patents unpatentable so that citizens  free to comply with the tax code in the most efficient manner without asking permission or paying a royalty our patent laws were written over fifty years ago and did not contemplate our modern economy where many products involve hundreds and even thousands of and i yield her two minutes gentleman from california is recognized the two minutes to this floor today with this legislation i want to talk about one issue and that's then you do to a flawed federal court decision in one nine hundred ninety the holdings patent trolls have been able to file cases more or less wherever they choose in the united states and that decision has led to a forum shopping is plain of filed in jurisdictions where they knew they stood a better chance of winning and where they would get more money if they did win for example filings in eastern texas went from thirty two cases a year four years ago to over two hundred thirty four cases last year with a projected eight percent increase this year patent holders win twenty percent more often there and the awards  much bigger the presiding judge himself describes the district as quote a plaintive oriented district it's led to the formation of energies that exist solely to bring patent cases for example the conglomerate is formed to several smaller companies none of the companies create any technology they don't produce any products all of those companies are incorporated either in texas or delaware and they exist for one purpose only to bring patent cases so zodiac conglomerate has sued three hundred fifty seven companies mostly in the eastern district of texas manufacturing venue leads to overly aggressive litigation behavior which did deters legitimate innovation and  to individual inventors and universities noting their special role in the system of corporate plane of can only bring cases where the facilities are located if they have engaged in activities relevant to the patent dispute in some the bill restores fairness and clarity to patent litigation by with moving the most glaring instances of form shopping by patent trolls now i represent silicon valley which has a diversity of high tech biotech large companies small companies universities small inventors pharmaceutical companies we've got them all including small inventors working out of a garage a balance approach to innovation is essential to all of these entities and h r nineteen zero eight while this bill has been improved since its introduction back in april the scheduling of this bill for consideration today make what makes one question whether reform really is the majority's objective why else would we push a bill through on a friday afternoon under a structured rule that will only allow a few selected amendments even to be considered in fact since this bill was reported from the judiciary committee in july several of us as well as the stakeholders of a s leadership to slow this bill down to ensure that we have a true reform bill that's fair and equitable to all who use the patent system i believe the bill in its current form and even if the manager's amendment is adopted fails to strengthen the system congress created to foster and protect innovation in fact more than one hundred companies unions universities coalitions and other organizations have voiced their concerns with this bill these entities users of the patent system believe that the changes proposed by this act and in the amendments were considering that a will be harmful to their respective businesses will be bad for the economy and could threaten our status as the number one patent system in the world if that's even possible why would we rush to pass a bill that could jeopardize the very industry and employees that have made this nation what it is today innovation is the heart and soul of this country what has made the us the strongest patent system in the world is its ability to adapt to different business models and innovations protecting those who invent while at the same time encouraging public dissemination of course our patent system is not perfect the small business committee that i happen to be the ranking member held a hearing on march twenty ninth two thousand and seven examining how small businesses use the patent system and the impact that patent reform this patent reform would have on them the most revealing aspect of the hearing was the consensus among members and panelists the congress should be very practice law for twenty two years as i have before coming to congress and served on the judiciary committee for fifteen years and never even in all that time dealt with patent considerations and criminal law and other civil rights matters to a higher position it has been an eye opening experience for me the first time to serve on the subcommittee and to see how important patent law all is too stimulating encouraging innovation and to see how difficult and gotten much attention in this bill that i was surprised that as a member of the financial services committee that has so many regulators the various parts of our financial system which that that was contributing to the problem because innovations and ideas and inventions and communications traveling so fast that the law all can't always keep up with them and it's in that context that meaningful regulation is important so i wanted to point to that particular aspect and i appreciate the gentleman you only know  this is a disgrace one of the most important bills to come before this nation in sixty years concerting manufacturing and patten ability of articles and process these is so method that the democrats have given just four minutes of their thirty two people on the other side they hold them and ology they owe them at least another hour of debate but the american people deserve a lot more debate than that an amendment was filed at two forty six yesterday before the rules committee the manager's amendment one of the groups that contacted us represented pharmacies and labor unions and caterpillar and all kinds of manufacturing organizations got a whole of it finally had to analyze it overnight because of the complexity of the issues and said my gosh this could destroy the system of patent law and protection of of patent holders in this country and wh we're asking for is the opportunity to be able to explain it members of congress should not be placed in the position of choosing between innovation let me give an example caterpillars on one side peoria phil here's district hundreds of thousands of suppliers across the country including the midwest rim the maker of the blackberry is on the other side of the issue in favor of it but inside of rim is this mother board it's magnesium it's made by chicago white metals it's they have the finest process these for magnesium hot chamber diecast e a company that's the only die casting company in the country that's rated i s o fourteen thousand and one for its higher environmental standards you have to get on the inside of these machines to understand the importance of this law you have to be able to take every single word that's added at the last minute and be able to study it to see the impact apart american innovation that's what this debate is about is simply asking for more time the first thing we learn as members of congress is do no harm why should we place ourselves in the zation of choosing winners and losers in something as important as patent law with the excuse that we have to harmonize and we have to adopt asian and european standards of patent law what's wrong with the american system we are the innovators we are the ones with the great minds it's our system that is place in effect in the entire world all the products of the process these and the ideas that have made us free i would therefore ask the members even if you lean towards this bill to vote against it as a matter of free i just want to tell the previous speaker that we've had come a day about twenty different parts of our american industry and society and of course everybody's not equally happy and apparently you're one of those enormous time i don't have any more time gentleman from michigan you know to the distinguished gentleman from georgia judge hank coble for the whole work for bringing this important piece of legislation to the floor and it's a bipartisan effort although i'm a new member to the subcommittee i'm well aware that congress has been debating paten reform for several years this area of the law has not been updated for fifty five years yet patents touch upon so many different sectors from agriculture to biotechnology to manufacturing and computer technology in order to continue to stimulate growth and reward inventors in these various sectors we in congress are charged with finding the right balance is between protecting inventions and stimulating innovation our finding our finding fathers realized it was so important to protect inventions and promoting innovations that they wrote that protection into our constitution in article one section eight and for more than half a century the united states has led the world in research and innovation partly due to the fact that the us rewards its investors or its inventors and protects their ideas but since the last update to our system over fifty five years ago technology has rapidly changed and has revolutionized our economy in order to keep up with these changes congress has stepped forward to update this important body of law this bill makes several important changes including moving from my first to invent to a first to file system it places certain limitations on willful infringement it creates a new process a post grant review and it addresses changes to things in the repair of the u s patent system but something about this bill kept troubling me when i read the provision regarding the transfer venue i began to realize something was very wrong the provision said the court might transfer an action only to a district where quote the defendant has substantial evidence or witnesses unquote i could not believe that provision did not even allow a judge to consider fairness or justice or case loads or time delays or other courts where whether the plaintiff was a small entrepreneur with only a patents who could be led to bankruptcy by being forced to file in a court where they had a five year delay i was would have been absolutely staggered for my years as a judge to see a venue provision like this realize that i could get a trial within eighteen months in front of some of the best judges in the country and get fairness and yes an issue laid there were more prank plated victories but as i understand last year so it has been fifty fifty which is there's nowhere in the country comparable to that i begin to realize that some was very wrong and one sided when something like that could get into a bill and especially a manager's amendment without be unnoticed and who would want something like that and then you realize it's big companies who do not want others to have the opportunities that they did so that made me look again at the damage provision that was being completely changed or realized whom that was helping in whom that wo destroyed and i realize that the language for that must've come from the same top source who did not want anything by by small cookie cutter or mold to consider damages when for years now there has been many more michigan mr chairman i i should have called on sheila jackson lee earlier and i and and so i do at this point the gentle lady from texas and you two minutes and fifteen seconds to the gentleman gentlewoman the gentlewoman from texas is recognized for two minutes and fifteen seconds gentlewoman from texas and this thing with  conyers and ranking member smith this has been a long journey and as a new member of the subcommittee on intellectual property let me also thank both the chairman and ranking member a tough challenge it is important to express that this is a significant change in patent law but it is done to protect if you will the very treasure that has propelled america into an economic engine and that we must insist that it continue and i think the changes that have been made certainly to some may be startling but the effort was to bring all parties together and i'm delighted i did that even though there are questions about for example the first to file over the first to invent this committee saw fit to add my amendment that means there will be periodical of you view so that congress will be instructed of whether or not this works on behalf of all inventors big and small and then when we look at the workings and the section five dealing with first to file dealing with damages rather then passing this law for ever and ever in a minute that i added will give us an opportunity to study it to assess who is it helping who is it hurting for we certainly want to ensure that all are given an opportunity i am very glad that the manager amendment has impacted the damages provision the original bill seem to require all apportionment in all cases but in this instance the mannerism image has made it as one of the factors so therefore when you look at a posted sticker you can determine how much the glue has helped the postage sticker this is apportionment of damages in case there was a lawsuit i know that there are many groups such as the innovation alliance that i look forward to working with as we make our way through to ensure that this bill answers the questions of big and small and feel the economic engine of manufacturing universities pharmaceuticals and others small inventors i asked my colleagues to the gentleman from texas has five minutes remaining the gentleman from michigan has five and three quarter minutes from any gentleman from michigan i'm pleased now to call on my neighbor and friend m toledo ohio and i recognize her for two minutes gentlewoman from ohio is recognized for two minutes i thank my good friend from the great state of michigan for yielding the chairman of the committee and unfortunately have to disagree with him on this bill and urge my colleagues to vote no on h r one thousand nine hundred eight because we don't want to weaken the u s patent system this is surely not a time with a trillion dollar trade deficit to do more selling out of america and to try to harmonize our standards down to some of the worst intellectual property pirates like china this bill essentially makes it easier for infringers to steal u inventions and it's truly sad that we are only given a few seconds to talk about this that alone should tell our colleagues vote no give us a chance to open this up and talk about how this is going to affect jobs in america this bill affects two thirds to eighty percent of the asset value of all u s firms most industrial companies in this country oppose it over two hundred organizations across this country oppose it including electronics industry pharmaceutical industry small inventors universities and yet we just get a few seconds here let me tell you what's going on mr emanuel was down here a little bit earlier reading a list of the big semiconductor companies the high tech firms and this bill does heavily benefit them because they are some of the worst property intellectual property infringers what this bill does is it supports those large transnational corporations that repeatedly infringe on the pat and they're looking to reduce what they have to pay in the courts now they've had to pay about three point five billion dollars in fines over the last couple years and it was deserved but that represents less than one percent of their revenues and what they're trying to do is use this bill to make get harder for small inventors and others to file what does this bill change it says to an inventor unlike since seventeen o nine in this country we say if you are first to invent from maine mr michaud for two minutes gentlemen from maine is recognized for two minutes i think the gentleman for yielding today i rise in strong opposition to the pattern on the two thousand and seven while i appreciate all the hard work that chairman berman did on this bill i think this bill is bad for a manufacturing industry we have been told at the manager's amendment that nuclear improves this bill it actually is worse than the underlining bill especially when it represents the damages section in the bell this bill is fundamentally flawed it can't be fixed by the manager's amendment this bill will weaken patent protection by making patents less reliable easier to challenge and cheaper to infringe this severely threatens american innovation jobs and creativeness and ought to be opposed hundreds of companies and organizations around the country have written congress to raise their strong opposition and their strong objections to certain provisions of these bills manufacturing organize aber biotech nanotech pharmaceuticals small businesses university economic development organization have serious concerns about this legislation for companies that are watching this legislation and eager to attack us patten the economic times reports that indian companies see an opportunity to challenge our patent and by doing so they will leave our businesses in litigation crisis we are compromising many about industries by passing this bill we are creating a litigation nightmare we need to proceed to get a better bill and i would urge my colleagues to defeat this legislation so we can move forward and have legislation that we can get more people who will support pattern form which has to be changed but urge my colleagues to defeat this legislation with that idea back to balance my time gentleman yield back the balance of his time the a reserve the balance of his time the gentleman from texas the chairman i yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from california mr isay as a member of the judiciary committee and the holder of thirty seven s patent the gentleman from california is recognized for five minutes speaker and for those who may be interested some of them have my patents have expired more will i'm no longer a day to day inventor but i will always have the soul of an venture the belief that in fact if you have an idea you can go to the patent office and for a relatively de minimus amount of money you can in fact protect that for a period of twenty years from the time you ask the patent office to protect your invention and to give you an opportunity to make a small or not so small fortune off of it i don't think there's anyone in the congress who owes more their reason for being here to the success of  myself my company grew and thrived because we were able to protect our intellectual property patents copyrights and trademarks so since i've been here as a non attorney coming to the congress and asking to be  because a little bit like sonny bono that's where the things he knew about were legislated he knew about copyrights and songs i know a little bit about patents and a lot about the flaws in the system and mr speaker there are many flaws in the system and this bill has been the best work by the best minds both in the way of members of congress but also in staff trade associations in industry to bring out those mistakes and to try to find solutions today you've heard a lot of anger and rancor about china nobody could want america to prosper more than i do but in fact by next year more than half of all patents in the u s will be granted to non u s companies this is not a debate about protecting patents against foreigners foreigners are patenting in our country and we in we invite that innovation it has often led to prosperity in all aspects of america i know there's no generally but i understand there will be and i'll be submitting a long letter from u c s d connect an organization founded by bill watterson in the university of california san diego in which they along with california health care institute bio jen jen pro in vitro gin pfizer qualcomm and others all say this is a good bill but we have some additional areas we'd like to find compromise on some of the things in this letter of yesterday are included in the manager's amendment some will be included in amendments that are be heard on the floor in a few minutes mr speaker this is a work in process but since when does this body say that in fact the good will be sacrificed in search of the perfect we have never done that every bill that goes through here is by definition the best work we can do as a continuous body one that in fact will come back again after this bill becomes law and continue working on refinements i'd like to quickly say that in that in fact there are amendments that will be offered that will deal with some of the very issues that people have said today are an outrage because they're not there i would hope that my colleagues even if they're not going to vote for the final bill will come and support the amendments that make this bill better because as a body what we do best is we take the we take the best ideas from the best places we can get them we bring them together and we create the best bill we possibly can to speaker that's what we've done here today it is in fact the best work available and people who are dissenting today we welcome on a bipartisan basis they're employed to find language that will make it better to speaker that in closing the one thing i would say is that we are past the point of compromise what we're into is finding win wins we're looking to take issues in which one side is for and one side is against and find real middle ground and we have done that in a couple of areas we will continue to want to do that i'm a small inventor i in fact want to make sure the small there is protected that's why this bill is going to maintain the right of a small inventor or any inventor to retain the secrecy of their invention if they are not granted a pattern that is why we are going to limit the regulatory authority of the p t o so that for a time for as long as we need to every time they produce propose a rule we will have a right and an obligation to consider it and if even one member of this body opposes it to bring to a vote that opposition to the rule these kinds of compromises and win wins and and thoughtful legislation are unusual in this body and that's why i believe that this will win overwhelming support here we will continue to work to find an even better bill in conference with the senate because in fact we are a bi cameral body we have to in fact get something that both sides can live with i want to thank in closing mr berman mr conyers and certainly mr smith and mr coble because they have made this gentleman the gentleman from michigan mr chairman and introduce for our closing speaker the distinguished gentleman from florida mr bob wexler to have the balance of our time gentleman from florida's reckon us for two minutes thank you mr chairman as a co chair of the congressional caucus on intellectual property promotion i rise in strong support of this patent reform legislation because it is critical for the continued growth of american businesses and the creation of high paying jobs in america this bill will nurture and protect inventors thereby promoting future alexander graham bell's and tomorrow's microsoft's for more than two hundred years strong patent protection along with timely examination of patent applications has helped secure the economic success of the united states by empowering inventors and encouraging the development of american business both large and small every day americans rely on the innovation that comes from our patent system from new computer technologies to medicines for america's seniors the american patent system provides the fuel for most important technological accomplishments in america today our capacity to come up with new ideas actually outstrips the value of the goods we make the licensing of u s patents contributes approximately one hundred fifty billion dollars to our annual economy and intellectual property including patents is the only economic area where the united states maintains a solid trace trade surplus with the rest of the world a well functioning patent system is vital to america's commercial and scientific entrepreneurs and preserve the incentives for innovation as guaranteed and the united states constitution this legislation will america will make america more competitive in the global marketplace not less we need to support mr berman mr conyers in their effort to produce what i would respectfully suggest is the most important economic legislation that this house will pass this is excellent for america's workers it's excellent for america's universities and our economy at large thank you m expired all time for general debate has expired pursuant to the rule the minute in the nature of a substitute printed in the bill shall be considered as an original bill for the purpose of amendment under the five minute rule and shall be considered read no amendment to the committee amendment is in order except those printed in the house report one ten dash three one nine age memet may be offered only in the order printed in the report by a member designated in the room board shall be considered red shall be debatable for the time specified in the report equally divided  controlled by the proponent and an opponent of the amendment should not be subject to the amendment and shall not be subject to a demand or division of the question it is now in order to consider a member at number one printed in house report one ten dash three one does the person who controls the time against a manager's amendment have to be against the manager's  suggest that whoever does control the time should be in opposition and if there and if mr smith who i respect greatly does not oppose the manager's amendment he should not be in control of the debate against the manager's amendment and i would no there are others of us who would like to have that gentleman from michigan to recognize thank you mr chairman i yield myself as much time as i may consume and i rise in support of the manager's amendment which is of course very bipartisan and which makes further changes to the underlying bill now this is a work in progress the reason  came up so late in the afternoon yesterday in the rules committee is we were making changes to accommodate the minority side and and so it is even now the manager amendment is a piece of work that will not be concluded until we come out of conference and i'm sure mr berman will have some comments to make about that i want anyone who has not seen the manager's amendment or wants to review it even as it's discussed on the floor today to please come to my seat and i will be happy to provide them with a copy of it well what is it do we deal with damages the most controversial provision of the bill with labor with the universities with an equitable comment conduct and additional changes that will be made for workers and inventors how do we help them well there was concern that in our attempt to simplify the assignment procedures we cut the inventor out of the process we've ensured that changes to applications will require inventor involvement and also there was a fear about working environment at the p t o we inquired of the general accountability office to conduct a study of examiner work conditions and find the examiners themselves were concerned about the quality submission requirements that their job would be outsourced we ensured that that will not happen now damages we made further changes to explain clearly that apportionment is not mandatory and the calculations of damages can be considered under a similar formula the courts use today universities we spent enormous time and and i have as many universities is michigan if anybody has in any other state in the union and to address their concerns we spent unbelievable amounts of time negotiating with them individually and collectively about the expansion of prior user rights which might reduce the value of their patents and harm their ability to license inventions we've eliminated the expansion instead of calling for a study of the operation of prior user rights in countries where they already exist to determine their effect it allows universities to sue and this tricks where they're located but does not extend that right to university associated nonprofit organizations we deal with an equitable conduct by tightening the standards for pleading and finding an equitable conduct as a defense to infringement we continue to operate in good faith with additional changes we've adopted suggestions made by outside groups to improve our post grad opposition provision change the discovery standard to two interests of justice and ensure that a p owner can bring a patent suit even if opposed grant sued is instituted so we even address every concern that has been brought to our attention no concern was too small or or too technical and we continue even now to listen to the parties and other ways to continue to enhance the bill so now is the time for  five minutes and i would ask permission to grant miss kaptur of ohio five minutes of the ten minutes in opposition for her to control that time i thank the gentleman without and without objection the gentlewoman from ohio was recognized thank you and i thank the gentleman kindly for you'll be me this time on the manager's amendment you know what's really sad about this bill is that it is very complicated and it's a work in progress as we sit here on the floor it's too important for america and for the future of our industrial an economic base to be treated this way and i know that the chair of the subcommittee in the full committee are listening as i speak today we shouldn't be drafting this  there's something very important i was not able to address earlier and that he is that this bill prematurely reveals inventors secrets in one nine hundred ninety nine the pat knack required the patent office to publish on the internet a patent application eighteen months from the date of filing but the act also allowed inventors to opt out from that if they agreed not to file for a patent in another nation that's a so called opt out provision now twenty percent twenty between twenty and thirty three percent of us origin patent opt out of the system they're small people they're trying to get the venture capital to start up their company and so forth and the average time the patent office takes the process of patmos thirty one months thus all the secrets in all patent applications will be made available to every pirate in the world for more than a year before a small inventor any inventor has a chance for patent protection or we're going to be told well mr ice's amendment will fix this no it will not more argue against that a little bit more down the road the several speakers this morning mr welch of vermont mr johnson of georgia said that well we need this reform because we haven't had patent reform since one hundred fifty two that's not true there have been seventeen amendments and major bills before this congress that deal with pat reform in the last fifteen years the problem with this bill is that it tries to harmonize to lower standards in the world rather than cause other countries to harmonize up to our standards it takes the way the right a first to invent and it transfers it to first to file that means an inventor who would come to the patent office here in the united states no matter how small and file the fair a patent got the right as an inventor first to invent could be superseded in the international market by someone who happened to catch that invent i'm the internet or elsewhere and file it in china first so it changes that from a first to invent to a first to file system this is a substantial change from the system that has been in place in this country since the early seventeen hundreds you know what i said earlier what's going on here is the big proponents of this the semiconductor companies and mr emanuel read some of their names have been fined substantially for patent infringement over the last several years about three point five billion dollars and they're trying to get the law changed to make it easier for them you know if they have a right to exist they have a right to function the problem is they've been taken to court and there are fifteen standards the courts use to ascertain damages they want to reduce it to one and make the fourteen optional you know what the federal judges are saying don't do that we like the current system it gives the courts the flexibility that they use why should a few transnational corporations sort of the big tech companies have this much power in this congress why don't we have the rights of others to be heard here fully rather than having to condense such a serious  few seconds here on the floor why am i opposed to this bill i'm opposed to this bill because it gives too much power to the big tech transnationals and it takes away power from the universities they're opposed to this although some of them california where so many of these big tech companies are located are happy but come to ohio come to wisconsin come to new york there's lots of universities there are opposed to this so it's giving too much advantage to a few companies in addition to that it totally turns upside down the first to invent system to a first to file system and it would permit lots of infringements internationally it does eliminate the opt out provision where if a small inventor doesn't want their invention put up on the internet it required doesn't it takes away the opt out provision from them mr ice's amendment does not fix it we want an opera too nitty to fix that because we want to protect the third of inventors that do not file internationally that do not want their patents put out there like that and they are not the big companies they're the smaller companies and why force them to go into court they don't have the money to defend themselves anyway there's broad based opposition to this bill there are lots of organizations including the electronics engineers medical college of wisconsin there are many many others cornell university all opposed to this i thank the gentleman for yield me the time and allowing me to broaden the record here in the very one sha rebuttal the university support this measure small inventors a support this measure  this bill is to create jobs in america how could anybody think that i wouldn't be support would be supporting a bill that didn't do this and patent a lot of reform and i'm pleased now to  my friend from california mr herder for purposes of our colloquy i'd like to thank the ranking member for engaging in this colloquy as you know the manager's amendment was released yesterday afternoon and it contains language concerning section three thirty seven proceedings before the u s international trade commission however this language was not considered by the committee on ways and means even though it is squarely and our jurisdiction i'm aware that the chairman rangle and chairman conyers of exchange letters and wish chairman conyers has acknowledged that this issue is within the jurisdiction of ways and means committee and i will support a request for c erees to be named from the ways and means committee as you know section three thirty seven proceedings are very complex and we must ensure that the full ramifications of this language are clearly understood as ranking member of the ways and means trade subcommittee i hope that you would agree with me that these provisions warrant further analysis and i ask that you would work with me and other members of the committee in conference to ensure that these provisions are thoroughly understood as a bill moves through the legislative process mr chairman i want to thank my friend from california for pointing these provisions out and i certainly do agree with them and will work towards that go  the ranking member you have to me and i'll be happy your back the balance of my time to the chairman of the committee i thank you i want to assure the gentleman that i ask unanimous consent to put the letter between myself and the chairman of ways and means and to the charles wrangle it into the record and i completely agree that it was totally inadvertent and we want the ways and means committee to sirte and we will help them assert their full rights in terms of the jurisdiction in this matter and i thank you for bringing it to our attention and i wish to thank the chairman and the ranking member thank you wouldn't well i was in the rules committee yesterday the gentleman from california said with regard to the types of damages in the standards for damages that could be used but the judge would have the discretion to determine that well take a look at the manager's amendment that discretion has been taken away and now there is a presumption of the most on or us in favor the most honors provision did it with damages and that really would impact the small inventor let's take a look at what would happen with the with the majority's view on patent damage reform the wright brothers airplane here here's the patent i got a picture of it right here the flying machine if it had been patented today or know if the rules that the majority is suggesting now were in effect at the time that the wright brothers got their pat the amount that they recovered would have been limited to the fraction of that to you of the surface surface controls alone to it even though everything else went on what was called an airplane but the thing never flew that's what this does to innovation so if you want to get something for you trim to have a derailleur on's and whatever else they put on the aircraft that's fine but this is an example of nobody else in the entire debate is given one example except me as what this is what happened in oil or not you know i will not yield i will not yield because this is the only opportunity that the people oppose this bill have had to talk about the actual impact of the law upon actual situation well you know like twenty seconds whatever under the entire market value rule which is in this bill gentleman from california how much time do i have left gentleman from california is three minutes remaining and time on the other side gentleman from michigan has two and a quarter minutes remaining gentlemen in california ok changes the whole concept of how damages are assessed and who is benefited by this what we have to ask ourselves we just talk about the wright brothers and the little guys who actually made all the difference and whether or not america has a high standard of living yeah the damages that these small inventors have when people violate their rights and how those damages are assessed that's right in this legislation yeah they're changing it in the benefit of the  s they're beating down the little guys making it more difficult for the wright brothers and for all the other little guys who have come up with these ideas and in order to help the big corporations and by the way let me just add this thought we're not just talking about american corporations here we're not talking about making inventors just vulnerable to the big american corporations we're talking about multinational corporations and we are talking about foreign corporations our little guys with just this change are going to be just dramatically damage their ability in order to protect their rights will be dramatically reduced mr speaker this is just one example of the type of  diminishing of the rights of the inventor in this bill yet we are unable to discuss it fully one hour of debate for a bill that's being described here as one of the most important let pieces of legislation in the century one hour of debate in which the opposition was not given a chance to control any time in opposition this is a disgrace this is what's going on this alone should raise the red flags of all of our members saying some is going on here there's a power play people who are against legislation aren't even able to control the time in order to present their case what's happening here we've got a manager's amendment now that was permitted to be changed after it left committee there wasn't even a proper debate on this bill then and this manager's amendment in the committee much less the subcommittee so what we have here is a power play by somebody who is just trying to adjust the rules don't count when it comes to this bill because somebody out there really wants it really bad in order to not give us a chance to give the other side not give the full committee a chance even to discuss the details that have changed in the manager's committee not to let the subcommittee play its role now all i'm suggesting is this should raise a red flag for all of our members all of us should be aware that when these type of  being played some going on and it's the legislation at the that's being pushed through probably is not good legislation but instead helps a small group of powerful people of california gentleman from if you can i'm much time remains gentleman from michigan has two minutes and fifteen seconds remaining in the gentleman from california his time has expired son of labor out of labor represents labor all my life being told publicly that i don't represent the little guy from people whose connection with working people and yielding and i would like to yield to the gentleman from oregon for forty five seconds for purposes of our colloquy i thank the chairman and as both chairman conyers and chairman berman are aware the version of this legislation in the other body contain section that ends the diversion of fees in the patent and trademark office absent compelling consideration would the chairman be amenable to working to keep that provision in conference reclaiming my time as that is a be to reduce backlogs to to hire qualified people and to come to a better operations of that critical office i thank you chairman and the chairman of the committee will be  i have never said quote labor supports this bill what i said was labor thinks a number of improvements have been made particularly in this manager's amendment there are other issues that they concern them that they believe we're moving in the right direction and that they have no opposition to the passage of this bill understanding they have other concerns that want to be addressed the same applies for a number of pharmaceutical companies look in the major institutional and they're not small guys mr rohrabacher opposition to this concerns about this bill come from large and important gentleman's time has expired now time for a debate on this amendment has expired when it went on the next amendment is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from michigan those in favor place ai those opposed please say no now in order to consider a member number two printed in house report one ten dash three one nine for what purpose does the gentleman who seeks recognition for what purpose of the gentleman from california ari historic and important american only right for an inventor who is denied a pattern to keep that pattern a secret additionally it allows sufficient time in the process for a patent holder to know that his patent his or her patten either will or will not likely be granted significant claims for that reason we struck a balance between the rest of the world that recognizes that  patents are normally published after eighteen months we said no it will be the greater of the second office action which can be anywhere from three to five years or  that the eighteen months and we did so because we believe somebody should know whether they're going to receive significant claims or not before they're forced to decide whether or not to retain a trade secret it's an important issue it's one that i believe fine will allow us a final and lasting way for a secret to be balanced with the the interest to not have submarine patents and unknown information with that i'd be pleased to further yield to the chairman of the full committee we've reviewed the amendment it's an important contribution and we're prepared to accept the amendment we thank you for your thank you and even further yielding to the chairman of the subcommittee i think the gentleman and i also agree with him and i would like to use the time if you will i mean to finish the sentence which is are there spec to these important kind of companies and that in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical field would just want to repeat a number of things they want first inventor to file not first to file first inventor to file repeal of the best moe defense reform of the inexorable conduct events are in this bill and i we intend to work with them on the damages issue between now and a final conference report to try and come to a better understanding on that very important but very complicated field thank you in further yielding to the ranking member gentleman is recognized for five minutes first and foremost let us know that over and over again we hear well they are not opposing the bill well the labor unions and others many of them are opposing the bill but the one but the ones you're describing are you're just saying they aren't necessarily supporting the bill what we're saying that they are not supporting the bill this is been reconfirmed by what our my colleagues have said in the last minute also let us know over and over again we're we're going to work this out we're going to work all these things out in the bill as it as it moves through the process which means to all of us there are major flaws in this bill huge flaws in this bill and we have to take it just on faith that they're going to work out all these flaws as it goes through the process i would suggest no i'm sorry let me finish my statement i would suggest that that we take this that we vote no on this bill and then let's correct those flaws and come back to the floor when you've got a build up isn't flawed let's go back to the floor when you can support a bill with an honest debate and not be so afraid of a debate that should neuter the chances  choice is would you rather would you rather had the inventor shot with a pistol or a rifle in either case you know ends up dead now why a he or she ends up dead why is that because the nine hundred ninety nine tat required the patent office to publish on the internet a patent application eighteen months from the date of filing but the issue really is it takes an average of thirty one months for a patent review mr i think the league brings it up to what twenty four months that what happens is there's a gap between when it's filed and when it's approved and you have to go up on the internet under current law you can opt out of that you can protect your invention not have some i japan or somewhere else take it from you that is not in this bill the elimination of the opt out provision is a terrible terrible that omission and a major change from existing law in the ice and then that does not make it better i  made a really important observation here and that is at the end of the day the ice amendment does make some changes but in the end of the day there will be american patents which the which applications in which the inventor would like to keep secret until he gets the patent issued which will be published for all of the themes in china and india and japan and korea and elsewhere who would like to have all of that information before the patent  average amount of time for a patent for a little over forty months so in other words your invention is out there and you have no way to protect it globally i think the gentleman for yielding so in the end where mr eyes is amendment does take things to wonder two steps forward the fact is it doesn't come anywhere close to offer in the protection that currently exists in the law that is being destroyed by the by the language in the steel american technologies act  just note for my own situation in terms of the chairman asking me about my credentials and i did in terms of being associated with labor i was a member of a labor union i actually scrub toilets at times in my life i have had menial jobs i care about the working people my family comes from working class farmers poor farmers and regular and people who went off to defend this country the american people their standard of living of ordinary people depends on technology this credentials you voted against nafta on the floor you were a leader on your side of the aisle that that was proven to be right but this is going to do this is going to nafta tie the patent system and allow china to infringe and more of our invention to we should not permit this to happen we should be allowed to fully debate that for the people of this country two thirds of the value of companies up to eighty percent of our industrial companies value relate to their patents and we should be given more respect we should give our constituents more respect than compressing this debate  government i'm glad we've all proved our working class credentials and support of working people and i'm very impressed if not surprised and so here's what  i want to describe this debate this currently going on and the second provision here is the one man in congress with more as as a small time inventor than anybody in the house and the senate being explain to why this is contrary to the interests of small time in venice very interesting i thank the gentleman and  membership and to having gotten a lot of grease under fingernails for miss captors understanding because i think what she brought up is crucial and full understanding is essential as to this amendment this amendment if it takes ten years to get a saw a second office action will give the inventor ten years of no one else seeing it the it is an infinite period of time subject to the twenty year expiration it is in fact an infinite period of time and as an inventor i chose the second office action even though small inventors said the first office action was good enough because i was aware that the first office action is most often a rejection over which you overcome most of the objections the second rejection if there is one they usually accept some and if they give you rejections you usually don't overcome them and the venture community if you had a second rejection tends to discount  potential additional claims so that's the reason i chose those because in fact it gives you unlimited time to pursue your pattern up to and through a second and usually final rejection with a gentlem preserve the opt out provision of the existing law it does the under this provision if you receive your second and usually final rejection and you say ok i'm going to take my within ninety days i'm going to discard my moment and then number three printed in house report number one hand x three nineteen also by mr isay of california or so at the house resolution six thirty six the gentleman from california mr rising and a member opposed ajmal control five minutes the chair recognizes the gentleman from california thanks chairman and briefly explain the amendment almost every single agency of the federal government has rule making authority but quite frankly rules are in fact laws made by agencies so when the patent and trademark office repeatedly has asked us for rule making authority it has been a long process to figure out the best way to allow them to make rules but to retain our genuine constitutional obligation over the effects of those laws so in doing so what we did was we crafted a constitutional review we're not allowed to veto these agencies but we are allowed to overrule them and in doing so what we have decided to do is to allow any member of the house or the senate to bring a motion in opposition to any rule produced or proposed by the and trademark office and we will in fact within sixty days hear that rule that opposition and make a decision this is designed specifically to stop any overreaching under this  underlying bill from potentially causing things which we would not have legislated to in fact be legislated well recognizing that we want the patent and trademark office to have the ability to move swiftly and accurately to the conclusion of patents on behalf of our economy and with that i reserve the balance of my time gentleman reserves the balance of his time what purpose does the gentleman from california run i rise in opposition to the amendment gentleman's recognized for five minutes  this is yet another example of why this overall bill should be defeated the fact is that we shouldn't be changing the provision in permitting outside agencies and taking the authority away from us from setting the basic ground rules about patents in the first place we this this idea that well let me put it this way this bill is so filled with this type of of imperfection and as we have our guarantee from those people who brought this building the floor so precipitous lee they will work really hard to make sure all the flaws are out i would suggest that that statement alone should have all these red flags going up for all of us and then the muting of the opposition and not permitting us on an adequate amount of time to actually discuss the provisions of the bill and not giving us time to control our own opposition again should be the red flags for all of us who is isis so much i will more people like darryl i say i want more people to have the opportunity to create patterns to use ingenuity to to do well based on their thought processes and i'm afraid now this bill will prevent us from having the opportunity to have more their ally says the amendment works on one of the problems with g we'll look at the regulations a but my goodness this is a comprehensive bill we keep hearing you know we need comprehensive bill and red flags went up in my mind whereby i heard that oh yes own immigration reform we had to have a comprehensive bill because there were some things that needed to be passed some people thought that they knew could not pass if they had been bright enough light of day shown on them and so we have a comprehensive bill to put some things in there that do more damage than good we need more time to look at these provisions so that we can ensure that there are more daryl ices that get to have the same opportunity to do as well and my guess is proud as our good friend from california yield back now has three and a half minutes remaining i'm sorry the general in california just did what you will to your one minute miss capper the gentleman from ohio is recognized for one minute thank you mr chairman i just want to place on the record opposition to mr i es amendment to try to politicize decision making that is done by professionals over at the patent office but in doing so also to place on the record who's financing the expensive lobbying campaign on behalf of the bill that is before us today they are a coalition of companies including transnational corporations adobe microsoft cisco intel e bay lenovo dell and oracle during the period of one nine hundred ninety three to two thousand and five four of them alone paid out more than three point five billion dollars in patent settlements and in the same period their combined revenues were over one point four trillion dollars making their patent settlements only about one quarter of one percent of those revenues now they wish to reduce even those costs not by changing their obviously unfair and often illegal business practices but by persuading congress and also the supreme court to wete new weaken us patent protections we ought to stand up for american inventors we should not allow this bill to and i'm glad these great sons of labor like the gentleman from california who knows his voting record labor and so unfortunately  i recognize how he's supporting the working people and the person who's and then it more inventions and all of us put together is opposing this wall of inventors what  trying to point out things about each other and that's one of the reasons we needed more time in this debate so that we could actually get into the provisions of this bill the fact that no matter what happens with ice mistresses first amendment that still there will be patent applications that will be published for the world to see even before the patent is issued that our overseas competitors will then have information that they will be able to use to outcompete us even before our patents are issued to those inventors who have a lot of applied for patents those are the issues we need to talk about we need to talk about why the assessment of damages has been changed in a way that helps these big guys these big companies that miss kaptur as just outlined but and as well as the foreign corporations i might add and we need to wind at the expense of the small inventor the inventor is just trying to trying to prevent theft of his lifetime of work we have to know why that we've had  different validity and term different ways of determining the validity of a patent and opening up challenges in the in the front of the patent as well as afterwards so that we could add cost after cost after cost to the little guy we need to discuss these things in detail instead we had one hour and which the opposition i think had twelve minutes in order to discuss these issues this should raise the flag of everyone listening to this debate why is congress trying to both of my amendments are intended to improve this bill i don't stand before the committee of the whole to say that this bill will become perfect as a matter of fact in the general debate i named companies like bio common gen probe and in vitro gen who are part of u c s d connect who have specific areas where including in the material that they want continued work done on they are in fact dissatisfied with the bill because it hasn't done everything it could do but this amendment on rule making which would stop an arbitrary decision by the patent office on something it may want to do such as eliminate continuations etc there for a reason and i would hope that people who are going to perhaps oppose the bush bill was not yet good enough would recognize that it's crucial for this amendment to get into what if we are going to protect against arbitrary action by the patent and t rademark office and last but not least ms kaptur was was kind enough to ask one more question during the previous amendment that couldn't be answered and i just want to make it clear on the previous amendment you will be able to keep your secret through an unlimited period of debate back and forth with the patent office up to two full rejections and then ninety days in which to close and i would hope that it will do little to the generally i would hope the gentle lady would recognize that that's an improvement even if nothing is perfect i yield i thank the gentleman very much and as i said with isis choice it's either being shot with a pistol or rifle it does not guarantee that once the time under the current law when your patent claims are granted you have an obligation to make available to the world and to people of ordinary skill in the art how to knock off your product that's current law that's been around since the founding the deal between the patent office the american people if you will and the inventor is that you disclosed to the world if you're given those claims for a limited period of time we're not changing that in two hundred years we're protecting your right if you're not ever so it's called six rule eighteen further proceedings on the amendment offered bob the gentleman from california will be postponed it is now in order to consider a member for amendment number four for enter the house report one tend three one i started out in this state today to say that we work very hard for a long period of time to be able to look at the small and the big the big ben and the little man's inventor all of them have been great to america and we have been a faded from their inventions and their intellect this patent bill preserves the intellectual property the art the invention the minds of america and it doesn't fact protect us against those who would undermine this very viable economic engine and that is our mind out talent but i believe that all voices should be heard and throughout this whole process there's probably not one who focused on the damages issue as much as i did the proportionality issue and i work with mr berman and miss the car in years and our bipartisan friends and so this gives us an opportunity and my mim it is very simple and it doesn't wait seven years or ten years to give us answers it's one year it provides us with the opportunity in this way landmark legislation to study the patent damage awards in cases where such awards have been based on a reasonable royalty under section eighty four of title thirty five of the united states coat the study should at a minimum consider cases from one thousand nine hundred to the present it has a very detailed analysis and what that will do it will fin its way to this congress and we will have a better way of assessing the impact we are concerned proportionality is an issue but we're not ignoring your concerns and this particular study helps to bring us alon me just quickly suggest the entities that will be impacted in a positive way the american intellectual property laws association a number of universities that will be impacted from the university of illinois  massachusetts to the university of iowa maryland michigan minnesota new hampshire north carolina texas a and m small inventors will be impacted by this study because it will give us more information i'd ask my colleagues to support this amendment i reserve my time gentleman reserve the balance of her time for what purpose does the gentleman from michigan writes d interesting about the amendment from the lady from texas is the fact that she wants to have a study and i agree with that of patent damage awards f hundred ninety to the present case so this is very interesting because here we are about to do this massive change in law and no one's done the stay but now we're going to do the study that's why we have this massive change in law but this that this train just turned around with the caboose going forward that's why this bill has to be ditched yield back the balance of his time he thinks recognition i'm a woman i mean i fornia how much is time left on both sides the gentleman from california has four and a half minutes remaining the gentleman from texas like the people opposed to anything opposed to everything i'm really not i think this is a good idea the good amendment and i applaud my colleague from texas for pushing this forward i would like to had these results before we went forward with the so called comprehensive bill yes now yoga from mit and my intent was to respond to the disparate voices would you at least admit that this improves or adds to by giving us additional information thank you reclaiming my time i would have made it as i said i think it's a good idea i'm going to vote for it but i would rather have this is a stand alone before we do all these what some of referred to as direct kone and comprehensive measures  and not i do not question what so ever dissent sergey or the effort on behalf of the chairman for working people and others and i do not question the sincerity when we were told and i was among those who were told you can be in a would i support the amendment i would just like to note however that we have had over twenty one hearings in the subcommittee and have convened several briefings on top of that we've had reports in the national academy c and on this subject and i think the general ladies amendment to get still further information is valid i support it but certainly we have information today that has been gained over an extensive patents man is greatly respected for a scientific knowledge and we have been deeply appreciated in the devices he's given us in that endeavor in the last fifteen years in congress mr bartlett gentleman from maryland is recognized for two minutes without it without objection thank you for saying i've been for the last couple of hours doing what is seldom done in this house i've been listening to every minute of this of this debate and i felt compelled to come to the floor when i was listening to the debate i was reminded of the story of the father who was looking at the white shirt that he wore yesterday to see if he could wear it again and his daughter observed daddy if it's doubtful it's dirty and i thought of that when i was listening to this the baker's obviously this bill is doubtful we're amending it on the run and i wonder if  to protecting the rights of the little guy cause i was a little guy not just because of the little guy but because most of our creativity and innovation comes from the little guy and what i would suggest is that if th bill is so flawed that we're modifying amending it on the run and hope to make it ok when we come to conference wouldn't it be better just to send it back to committee and do it right the first time thank you very much  mistaken impression that this is being amended on the run is incorrect and i'm glad you listened to the full debate and i respect your position on that yet i haven't said what i want to say the point that you think it's being amended on the run is that we had about forty seven organization gentleman's time has expired gentlewoman from fifteen seconds to the gentleman my friend from california mr rohrabacher over and over again talks about the flaws in this bill other than for gohmert amendments on the issue of venue and one amendment from the gentleman from iowa that was a earmark amendment no other amendments were kept from consideration here for all the arguments about flaws where were the amendments to correct the flaws that they talk about for all the notions of war not against reform but this one isn't perfect in this was isn't right in this as some flaws and it hasn't resolved every issue to everyone's satisfaction nothing well where is their alternative bill they i'm telling you this is a big issue about whether we're going to address a system that the national mcadam e of science in so many other objective agencies said is myself what i would consume and let's note that there are several amendments that were not permitted by by the rules committee would not reprint all this but i did not submit the amendments because those of us who have been following this bill is fundamentally flawed the purpose of the bill this is support those large corporations that miss kaptur noted who are directly supporting the legislation and it is being opposed  dad by a large number of universities unions pharmaceutical industries biotech industries except for except for a so we have so everybody except the electronics industry in the financial industry who are already over in china making their profit at our expense are opposed to the bill i had i would yield mr right bartlett thirty seconds the remainder of my time i just wanted to clarify the basis for my observation the bill was being amended on the run i was simply quoting the chairman who said that they worked late last night changing the manager's amendment never going to continue to work through conference so that they could change the bill to make it better so obviously the bill is being amended is being changed on the run thank you ge from california a recorded vote or so it's called six of rule eighteen further proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from texas will be postponed it is now in order to consider amendment number five printed in the house report extend my remarks without objection as chairman i rise today in support of it an amendment that would simply clarify panel on what is known as best mode but for explaining my men and i and the need for it  to take a brief moment to express my personal gratitude to ranking member the mar smith for his years of work on this issue and to express my appreciation not only to chairman conyers but to chairman berman for the bipartisan manner in which they have proceeded on this legislation so vital as it is to our national life and to our economic vitality years of countless hearings great dedication and gone into this bill on both sides of the island and while mr chairman i'm  convinced that it's a perfect bill i believe as the gentleman from california said it it's a work in progress as is all complex american law and i think that moving forward is the right thing to do today with that i'd like to yield one minute to the distinguished ranking  member of the committee the gentleman from texas jim of texas recognized for one minute to share and i thank my friend from indiana for yielding and want to point out that he is a member of the intellectual property subcommittee of the judiciary committee i know he is going to describe this amendment very well so i will not go into that detail but simply urge my colleagues to support as well now you're back to bounce in my time i think the gentleman for his support mr chairman the constitution vests in article one section eight cla the power and the duty of the congress to quote promote the progress of science and useful arts by securing for limited times to inventors the exclusive right to their discover its close quote this is an express obligation of the congress under the constitution our patent laws as currently written were essentially drafted over fifty years ago and i believe it is time to update them to account for changes in our dynamic twenty first century economy we need to strengthen our patent laws to make sure the patents that are issued are strong high quality but i would submit that we also need to reform our patent laws to eliminate lawsuit abuse that has become so prevalent aspects of this legislation will do that my  the further as i've said before i'm sympathetic to those who say that further work on damages needs to be done in conference and i agree with their sentiment to the point and i trust that will occur on balance ssion is an important and useful step toward modernizing and strengthening our american patent law and i'm pleased to support it but i encourage members of the house not to take this step without first supporting the pence amendment which makes an important clarification of provisions governing what is known as best mode in patent law as you do to sherry committee markup this bill i first supported an amendment would have which would have repealed best mode in full american patent law requires that a pat application quote set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor of carrying out his invention close quote at the time the application is filed but providing the best mode at the time that location is not a requirement in europe or in japan or in any of the rest of the world and it has become a vehicle for lawsuit abuse in my view the best mode requirement of american law imposes extraordinary and unnecessary costs on the inventor and as a subjective requirement to the application process and i believe public interest is already adequately met in ensuring quality technical disclosures for patents at the judiciary committee i offered a best most mode relief amendment that was accepted  as a specifications requirement for obtaining a patent the intent to maintain the law the idea that patent applicants should provide extensive disclosure to the public about an invention but the pencil memon endeavor to remove best mode from litigation increasingly in patent litigation defendants have put forth best motives a defense and a reason to find patents on enforceable it becomes a virtually a satellite piece of litigation in and of itself detracts from the actual issue of infringement and literally costs american inventors millions in legal fees the intent of the amanat was to keep best mode in the patent trademark office my mammoth today continues this effort toward eliminating this archaic and costly provision of the law specifically the m m today makes it clear that arguments about best mode cannot serve as the basis for folks grant review proceedings it's quite simple in that effect with my m m and under the new post grant review system best mode will not be litigate that will lessen the burden put on patent holders in defending patents in post grant review proceedings and it will prevent the expenditure of millions of dollars in needless lawsuit abuse i encourage my colleagues to support them and then you would be very pleased to yield only to thank the gentleman for producing this amendment but also to appreciate all the work that he did on helping us make this bill as good as it was we thank you very much i thank the chairman for his remarks i urge my colleagues to support the  further clarify the intended best mode really and and i yield back the gentleman from california writes yes i rise in opposition to the amendment gentleman's recognized for five minutes all right and i would first of all submit for the record a list of several hundred many many people who have strong reservations even by the wording of what we have heard from the from the other side of this debate that there are people who've got serious questions even though they may not officially an opposition well to so many serious questions around that we have amendments like that of mr pence and the other amendments that we've heard we shouldn't be having this bill on this floor at this time much less muzzling the opposition so we have only an hour to debate on the central issues of the bill well instead we have had to argue our case hamper scamper here as opposition to the amendments of the bill only to get time to offer a few objections that's not the way the system supposed to work and it's not supposed to work that we bring bills to the floor and ask members for us to vote on it so that we can be fix it later on you know that should raise flags for everybody that the something to fix in this bill and in fact that this bill nothing to cure that what this bill bill does is use that as a cover to fundamentally change the rules of the game that are going to help those huge corporations that miss kaptur talked about as well as the overseas people are waiting to steal our technology now we can correct those problems and i would support that you bring a bill to the fore that gives more money to the patent examiners more training to the patent examiners gives them the ability keeps the money that goes into the patent office there to improve the system you're going to have lots of support but don't use the point out that in every year when pants are granted the very small number of lawsuits that are generated as a result of that for example in the year two thousand and six there were one hundred eighty three thousand patents granted one point four seven percent actually ended up in some type of lawsuit and more a most of those lawsuits were settled before trial the current system is working very well for the majority of inventors as losses have represented that smaller percentage going back as far as the eye can see i would like to place on the record those facts that in fact lawsuits are a minuscule percent of all patents reviewed and granted and i would also like to replace place on the record from the united states court of appeals the following letter from the chief judge who states that the present bill creates a new type of macro economic analysis that would be extremely costly and time consuming fire more so than current application of the well settled apportionment law this gentleman amendment as well as the underlying bill would result in additional court delays that could be severe and would probably in additional attorney fees and costs and many view that those additional costs is intolerable we're actually charging more for inventors to maintain their inventions now we tried to stop that years ago and were unsuccessful in doing that and now we are in this bill creating a more complicated legal system that's going to cost them more money we have a system that works we have the best patent system in the world we have the most innovation in the world and until and i hope this bill goes down to defeat so we can make it much much better we had a system where we protect the inventor from if they wish to opt who seeks recognition how much more time is left in this debate the gentleman from california now has thirty seconds remaining in my in the gym a mini anna has now expired time's expired so i would feel myself right to close  is the final i guess argument in this debate we can correct the flaws at the patent office we do not need to destroy the american patent system as it is function for two hundred years we do not may need to make all of our inventors vulnerable to foreign theft so they can so foreigners and large corporations can steal their creative genius and use it against us that's what this bill does it's being foisted off on us the process has been flawed as we can see we have had limited debate they brought this to the floor admitting there are flaws in the bill we need to defeat the steal american technologies act and go back and work on it so it will be real reform rather than a bill that's going to help america's economic adversaries i would ask my colleagues to join me in supporting the little guy against the big guy and demonstrating that's the rules of the game here and one in six hard questions on the amendment offered by the gentleman from indiana those  objection so ordered pursuing the close six rule eighteen percent proceedings will now resume on the amendment on which further proceedings were postponed the unfinished business is the request for a recorded vote in the member number one for the gentleman from michigan mr conyers on which further those in support of the request for a recorded vote will rise and be counted a sufficient number having risen a recorded vote is ordered members will record their votes by electronic device this will be a fifteen