Date: 1999-08-03
Speaker: GEORGE MILLER (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: California

Mr. Chairman. I move to strike the last word. I rise in opposition to this legislation. I appreciate the speech just given by the gentlewoman. except this is a little different than the problem she outlined. This is about preventing the injuries to those workers. This is about the fact that if we do this right. those. workers will not have to go on workers comp. their employers will not have to pay their health costs. they will not have to pay their compensation costs. and people can stay on the job. and they can feed their families and provide the wherewithal for their children. That is what this legislation is about. To suggest somehow that what we need is one more study. we need good science. The opposition to this legislation is not about good science. it is not about one more study. It is about a flat out opposition to the imposition of these rules and regulations to try to protect workers from musculoskeletal syndrome. and the purpose of that is this. that we can keep people on the job where they can remain productive. Now to listen to the Republican argument here simply we must suspend reality. we must suspend the reality of what every Member of Congress experiences when they fly back to their districts. and that is the number of flight attendants and others who are working on the airplane.- delivering meals. taking care of us while we are there. who are wearing wrist braces. elbow braces. tendon braces. all the rest of it because of repetitive motion. The redesign of the carts on the airplanes because of repetitive motion. the baggage handlers and others because of repetitive motion who are wearing belts and back supports and all those kinds of activities because of repetitive motion because they understand that if they do not do that. they are going to end up disabled. they are going to end up with health care dosts. and they are going to end up out of work. and their employer understands that. Suspend reality when going into the Home Depot. suspend reality when going into the Price Club or into Costco where we see people engaged in repetitive motion. who are wearing the kinds of preventive apparatus on their backs. on their arms and the rest of it so that they will not lose theworking hours. they will not lose that kind of income. Again. their employers understand that. their insurers understand that. and they require that to be part of the workplace. Mr. Chairman. that is what this legislation is really about. It is about the recognition of the reality of the workplace and what we can now do. what we have the ability- to do. and what we know from a medical/scientific standpoint will help prevent these kinds of injuries. injuries that plague hundreds of thousands of workers a year who are disabled and lose income. employers who lose the productivity of those workers. who have to train and retrain new people. who have to go out and find replacements for those individuals. That is what this legislation is about. It is not about one more study. We have peer reviewed the evidence here until we are blue in the face. We have provided the studies. and it has been going on and on and on. As somebody mentioned earlier. it was originally Elizabeth Dole who said the time has come now to deal with this problem because of the injuries that were occurring in the workplace. We see this being responded to where we redesign keyboards or structuring for the keyboard that will not induce the kind of pain for people who have to work at it all the time at the checkout counters in the supermarket. We are redesigning the checkout counter so that people. the clerks there. will not suffer these kinds of injuries to their arms and to their elbows as they do their job. So that is the kind of recognition that we are looking for. that is the kind of remedial activities that can be dealt with that can reduce the cost to the employer. can reduce the cost in the workplace and reduce health care costs. That is why it is so urgent that we not pass this legislation which is an attempt to obstruct the imposition of this rule. because this is a rule that workers deserve. This is a rule that workers need. that their families need if they are going to be able to continue to be gainfully employed. The evidence is clear. the science is clear. the health is clear on this measure. and the time has come. the time has come to implement this rule. We have had statements before from the Committee on Appropriations. as I was saying. that the effort was not to delay this. We now see that this is an effort to delay this because the Republicans believe somehow that if they win the election. they can cut a better deal 18 months from now. Well. the better deal is not for the American workers. It may be for the Republican Party. but it is not for the workers. This rule ought to be implemented. it ought to go into force and effect. and we ought to start protecting. We ought to start protecting working men and womenin this country who exhibit to us every day in the crafts and the trades and in the occupations in which they are employed at. the need for this rule because of the damage that is done to them. This damage is evident on its face. and that is why we ought to deal with this rule.