[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 113 (Tuesday, July 26, 2011)]
[House]
[Page H5503]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE JOBS OUTSOURCERS' BILL OF RIGHTS
(Mr. TONKO asked and was given permission to address the House for 1
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
Mr. TONKO. Mr. Speaker, in just a few hours, my Republican colleagues
will bring to the floor the Jobs Outsourcers' Bill of Rights. This
piece of legislation is an open attack on workforce protections, a
union-busting bill that will open loopholes for companies to ship our
jobs, American jobs overseas, and will make historic changes to
workers' rights, all to serve the well-connected special interests
community. This bill will allow companies to fire workers, workers who
think that they might have a better shot of supporting their families
in these precarious times by banding together to negotiate with their
employers. That right, the freedom of association, finds its origins in
the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.
Whether or not you like unions, there is no sense in making it even
easier to ship our jobs overseas. If this bill becomes law, a company
faced with a few organizing workers trying to form a union could close
an entire United States plant and move the work to China, where
sweatshop laborers will work for less than even the lowest-paid,
nonunion American workers. Actually, that's an assault on America's
middle class. I would urge my colleagues to oppose this reactionary and
poorly thought out legislation.
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