[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 12]
[House]
[Pages 15804-15808]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




 MOTION TO INSTRUCT CONFEREES ON H.R. 2830, PENSION PROTECTION ACT OF 
                                  2005

  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I offer a motion to 
instruct.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Clerk will report the motion.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Mr. George Miller of California moves that the managers on 
     the part of the House at the conference on the disagreeing 
     votes of the two Houses on the Senate amendment to the bill 
     H.R. 2830 be instructed--
       (1) to agree to the provisions contained in subsections (a) 
     through (d) of section 601 of the Senate amendment (relating 
     to prospective application of age discrimination, conversion, 
     and present value assumption rules with respect to cash 
     balance and other hybrid defined benefit plans) and not to 
     agree with the provisions contained in title VII of the bill 
     as passed the House (relating to benefit accrual standards);
       (2) to agree to the provisions contained in section 413 of 
     the Senate amendment (relating to computation of guaranteed 
     benefits of airline pilots required to separate from service 
     prior to attaining age 65), but only with respect to plan 
     terminations occurring after September 11, 2001;
       (3) to agree to the provisions contained in section 403 of 
     the Senate amendment (relating to special funding rules for 
     plans maintained by commercial airlines that are amended to 
     cease future benefit accruals);
       (4) to agree to the provisions contained in section 402 of 
     the Senate amendment (relating to authority to enter 
     alternative funding agreements to prevent plan terminations); 
     and
       (5) to recede to the provisions contained in the Senate 
     amendment regarding restrictions on funding of nonqualified 
     deferred compensation plans, except that--
       (A) to the maximum extent possible within the scope of the 
     conference, the managers on the part of the House shall 
     insist that the restrictions under the bill as reported from 
     conference regarding executive compensation, including under 
     nonqualified plans, be the same as restrictions under the 
     bill regarding benefits for workers and retirees under 
     qualified pension plans,
       (B) the managers on the part of the House shall insist that 
     the definition of ``covered employee'' for purposes of such 
     provisions contained in the Senate amendment include the 
     chief executive officer of the plan sponsor, any other 
     employee of the plan sponsor who is a ``covered employee'' 
     within the meaning of such term specified in the provisions 
     contained in the Senate amendment (applied by disregarding 
     the chief executive officer), and any other individual who 
     is, with respect to the plan sponsor, an officer or employee 
     within the meaning of section 16(b) of the Securities 
     Exchange Act of 1934, and
       (C) in lieu of the effective date specified in such 
     provisions contained in the Senate amendment, the managers on 
     the part of the House shall insist on the effective date 
     specified in the provisions of the bill as passed the House 
     relating to treatment of nonqualified deferred compensation 
     plans when the employer's defined benefit plan is in at-risk 
     status.

  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California (during the reading). Mr. Speaker, I 
ask unanimous consent that the motion to instruct be considered as read 
and printed in the Record.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from California?
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 7 of rule XXII, the 
gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller) and the gentleman from 
California (Mr. McKeon) each will control 30 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from California (Mr. George 
Miller).
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such 
time as I may consume, and I rise yet again with another motion to 
instruct the conferees of H.R. 2830, the pension bill currently in 
conference. These repeated motions have become necessary in light of 
the failure of the Republican conferees to include all conferees and to 
hear all voices.
  The House Democrats have been locked out of this conference since 
last March, so we have come to the floor again and again with motions 
to instruct that would press the conferees to protect America's workers 
and retirees from some of the worst proposals in these bills now being 
considered in that conference committee.
  Again and again, the House has voted overwhelmingly to support these 
instructions but the Republican conferees don't seem to be getting the 
message, or they don't seem to care. So I am calling on my colleagues 
to speak again, and this time a little louder.
  This is a new motion that would provide greater protections for 
workers' pensions in five critical areas.
  First. Protecting older workers' benefits in the cash balance 
conversion when pension plans convert from the defined benefit plan.
  Two. Ensuring that airline pilots do not see unfair cuts to their 
PBGC, the Pension Benefits Guarantee Corporation, because the FAA 
required them to retire at age 60.
  Three. Providing stretch-out payments for an airline industry that 
has been shaken by 9/11 and rising fuel costs.
  Four. Allowing for the alternative funding agreements when a plan is 
in trouble so that we can avoid the dumping of pension plans like what 
happened with the United Airlines debacle.
  Five. Providing for more equal treatment of executive and worker 
pensions. If we are going to restrict workers' pensions when a plan is 
underfunded, we should also restrict the executives that, in many 
instances, are responsible for that underfunding of the pension plans. 
After all, it is the executives who decide whether or not to fund the 
pension plan.
  From all the reports we have received to date, it sounds like the 
conferees are not moving to include these items in the conference 
report, despite the fact that the House has repeatedly instructed the 
conferees to include these worker protections.
  Let us go through these one by one and let us understand that this is 
about the protection of workers, it is about the protection of 
retirees, and it is about the protection of their families, because it 
is about the pension plans that these workers now have as a matter of 
their bargaining, their agreements, and their contracts with their 
employers.
  What we have now seen, and what too many workers have seen and what 
the American public has witnessed, is that employer after employer is 
announcing to workers that they are going to forego the support for a 
defined benefit plan, they are going to forego the support for health 
care benefits, and workers now see they are trapped. In many instances, 
those changes, those decisions by the employer snag workers who have no 
ability to restore that retirement nest egg that they are going to lose 
when the employer decides that they are going to terminate the pension 
plan.
  That is why we are offering this motion to instruct, to try to 
protect the retirement nest egg of hard-working Americans and their 
families from being devastated by the decisions of the employers on the 
termination or the dumping of the pension plans into the PBGC.
  So let us walk through what we are trying to do here. First. The 
protection for older workers in a cash balance conversion.
  This motion to instruct would have the conferees in the Senate make 
sure they prohibit against the discrimination of older workers by the 
practice of offsetting the earned benefit plans they have now with the 
new cash balance plans, and to make sure that we understand what the 
GAO has told us; that unless we provide some transition protection, 
almost all workers could lose up to 50 percent of their expected 
pension benefits.
  Listen to that again. Almost all workers could lose up to almost 50 
percent of their expected pension benefits. Again, those older workers, 
50, 55, 60 years old, will lose the most. Those are the same workers 
who have the least ability to save more money for their retirement, to 
earn more money for their retirement. They will take the biggest hit.

[[Page 15805]]

  We are asking that at a minimum, you protect employees that are 5 
years away from retirement because they do not have the ability to 
secure additional funds for their retirement. It means a dramatic 
diminishment of their the retirement plans, of their financial 
resources for their retirement, for their health care, for the 
sustaining of their families. That is why it is so important to 
understand that.
  This is what responsible employers have done, whether it is Verizon, 
or Honeywell, or Wells Fargo Bank or CSX Railroad. But other employers 
have chosen not do this, and now they want the protection of the law as 
they take away these benefits of the older workers.
  It is also what the Congress chose to do. We chose to provide a 
transition for Members of Congress as we changed the retirement plan of 
Congress to the TSP plan as opposed to a defined benefit plan. If it is 
good enough for Congress, why isn't it good enough for these workers 
and for their families?
  Obviously, when the Members of Congress have been asked to vote on 
this, they have voted overwhelmingly. In 2002, an amendment to take 
care of these older workers passed 328-121; in 2003, it passed 258-160; 
in 2004, it passed 237-162. The motion to instruct this past April, the 
House voted 248-178 to tell the conferees to protect these older 
workers.
  Unfortunately, either the conferees are hard of hearing or they 
simply don't care about these older workers, because it appears that 
when the conference report comes back in the next day or two on the 
pension bill, these older workers will not be protected.

                              {time}  1700

  Second, the case of the airlines. The motion to instruct would have 
the conferees agree to the Senate provision ensuring that pilots get 
their full pension guaranteed from the Pension Guarantee Corporation. 
They get their full pension, for those who were required to retire at 
an early age.
  So you have pilots who were required, under Federal law, to retire at 
age 60. The pension plan was terminated, through no fault of the 
pilots, in many cases because of 9/11 or higher fuel costs, and now 
they are being punished because the Pension Guarantee Corporation will 
only give you a full benefit if you retire at age 65. They had no 
ability to retire at age 65 because Federal law kept them from doing 
so. We think that, in fact, we ought to protect those employees.
  And the motion would limit the treatment of those pension plans to 
those that were terminated after September 11, 2001.
  The fix is needed now. United airline pilots are seeing their 
pensions cut by tens of thousands of dollars each year under you the 
pension guarantee rules. The retirement nest eggs have been devastated, 
but they have been twice, once by the unfair dumping of the pension 
plans and the PBGC by United, and now because the law says that they 
cannot have those full benefits because they retired before 65.
  In a motion this past March, the House voted 265-158 to instruct the 
conferees to give these pilots their full guarantee. Once again, the 
conferees either can't here the House of Representatives, they don't 
care about the House of Representatives, or they don't care about these 
workers, because they are not choosing to protect these pilots to the 
extent to which they should be.
  Third, we deal with the question of the airlines. We all know that 
airlines have been hurt by skyrocketing fuel prices since 9/11. They 
have been hurt by a lack of travel immediately after 9/11, and we have 
seen one airline after another go into bankruptcy. We have seen United 
Airlines terminate its pension plans and dump $10 billion of liability 
onto the PBGC, its workers, its retirees and the taxpayers. We have 
seen the U.S. Airways dump its pension plan, and we have read how Delta 
is now seeking to dump its pension plan. It would be devastating to 
hundreds of thousands of workers across this Nation if more airlines 
were permitted to dump their plans into the PBGC.
  These provisions that we are asking the conferees to impose give the 
airlines the ability to keep their plans going by stretching out their 
payments over 20 years instead of 7 years. And these provisions should 
be made available to all the airlines, not just a select few airlines. 
They should be available to those airlines that have frozen their 
plans, as well as those that meet the requirements of the Senate bill 
to keep their plans running.
  In March, the motion to instruct, the House voted 265-158 to provide 
the airlines with these critical reforms, with this lifeline for their 
economic health and the well-being of their workers. But the conferees 
so far haven't heard us and we need to speak louder.
  Fourth, the alternative funding agreements. The motion to instruct 
would have the conferees agree to the Senate provisions, which passed 
97-2, designed to prevent the pension plan dumping. These provisions 
allow the PBGC, the Treasury Secretary to enter into an alternative 
funding agreement with an employer if its pension plan is in danger of 
being terminated. If workers and retirees are facing the destruction of 
their pension plans, Congress should give the PBGC and the Treasury 
Departments the flexibility to work out alternatives to termination. If 
such alternatives to simply dumping the plan were available during the 
United Airline crisis, the largest pension termination in history, it 
may have been averted. A lot more needs to be done in this area so that 
we don't see just the callous dumping into the bankruptcy of the 
pension plans by these corporations that devastates their workers and 
their retirees.
  Fifth, and maybe this is one of the more serious ones, and that is a 
question of executive compensation. This motion to instruct would have 
the conferees agree to the Senate provision, again, passed 97-2, on 
executive compensation that would treat workers and executive pensions 
equally. Under the House bills, workers pension benefits are restricted 
if a pension falls below 80 percent funding. But what we see is there 
is no benefit on the executives unless it falls less than 60 percent 
funding.
  What we are saying is what the President of the United States, Mr. 
Bush, said during the Enron catastrophe, what is good for the captain 
is good for the crew.
  Once again, it is the executives that make decisions about funding 
these pension plans. But if they fall below 80 percent, the workers get 
restricted, but the executives continue to get their pensions, to get 
their benefits, to get all of the executive perks in that operation. We 
think that that ought to change. We think it is very clear that the 
executives, what they have done, in many instances, they ensure their 
pension plans outside of the bankruptcy system. So as they take the 
company into bankruptcy, they are guaranteed that they will get a life 
time pension worth millions of dollars. The workers get bankruptcy and 
get devastated and lose half of their benefits if they go to the 
Pension Guarantee Corporation.
  We believe the President is right. What is good for the captain is 
good for the crew, and that we ought to do this.
  Again, this past May, in a motion to instruct, the House voted 299-
125 to instruct these conferees. And what do you believe is going to 
happen? Apparently, the conferees are going to again ignore that vote. 
They are going to ignore the will of this House. They are going to 
ignore the will of the American people to have equity and fairness in 
the treatment of executives and workers during the troubled times for 
pension plans.
  So this motion to instruct is to take those five areas and to 
instruct the conferees at this 11th hour to deal with the fairness and 
the equity in the Pension Reform Bill to make sure that hardworking 
Americans don't have to crash to the floor, lose their homes, lose 
their retirement, lose their health care as we restructure pensions, 
and to make sure that we do treat the million dollar a year or the $10 
million or the $20 million, $50 million a year executive, that we treat 
them the same as we treat the workers.
  Very few workers in this country have any say in whether or not these 
pension plans are underfunded. We saw that in the case of Enron. They 
were

[[Page 15806]]

running downstairs telling the employees to buy the Enron stock, and 
they were running upstairs and selling their stock into the market 
because they knew the company was going to collapse.
  We think people ought to be treated fairly. They ought to be treated 
equally and clearly, clearly, we ought not to discriminate against 
older workers. That is what this motion to instruct does. Hopefully, 
when we send it, this motion to instruct, later this evening, the 
conference committee will hear us. They will hear the American people. 
They will quit ignoring the American people. They will quit dealing 
just with the special interests inside the Beltway, and doing what is 
good for the special interests, as opposed to what is good for the 
American public, what is good for the retirement systems in this 
country, what is good for the economy in this country, and what is fair 
to the workers and to their families.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. McKEON. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this politically 
motivated motion to instruct. I believe we are nearing the end of the 
pension reform conference, and this motion is nothing more than a last 
minute, desperate attempt to slow the most substantial retirement 
security reforms in a generation.
  Like the famous Yogi Berra saying, this is deja vu all over again. 
Throughout this pension conference, opponents of pension reform have 
attempted to distract from the process through these obstructionist 
tactics, and here we are again ready to deal with yet another.
  The latest motion to instruct, or motion to obstruct as is truly the 
case, is little more than a random jumble of unrelated issues being 
discussed in the ongoing pension conference. From purely a policy 
perspective, it is irresponsible to mix and confuse these complicated 
issues in this fashion. Members with opinions on one or more of these 
issues should not be forced into contradicting positions on other 
issues. But let's be very clear up front. This has nothing do with 
policy. It is all about politics.
  This pension legislation we are crafting is complicated, and those 
who support passing legislation to fix our pension system are working 
hard to bring a final bill before the full House and Senate for 
consideration. What the opponents of reform are doing today is putting 
their good names on a bull-in-a-china-shop exercise. They have cherry-
picked a handful of Senate positions that have evolved over time. It is 
reckless and, in the end, it will do nothing to advance the process. 
Here are just a handful of its flaws.
  Number 1, this motion to instruct would tie the hands of those who 
voluntarily offer hybrid plans, which are the sole bright spot in the 
defined benefit system. To place restrictions on a system that actually 
provides more generous benefits for the majority of workers than do 
traditional plans sets a very bad precedent.
  Number 2, this motion to instruct also would increase the deficit of 
the PBGC, which is exactly the opposite of what we are trying to do. If 
this provision were applied, taxpayers could count on an additional 
cost of $2.5 billion to the PBGC over the next 10 years.
  Number 3, this motion to instruct would assign the PBGC which, in 
some respects, is like an insurance company, with developing industrial 
policy for the troubled plans via a ``workout program.'' This would pit 
companies against one another. And this process would be steered by a 
quasi-governmental agency, often dependent upon the whims of the 
administration in power.
  And finally, this motion to instruct attempts to score partisan 
points on the issue of executive compensation. But this is an issue the 
House bill already responsibly addresses, and any final conference will 
do the same. The House-passed pension reform restricts golden parachute 
agreements when the rank and file plan is considered at-risk.
  Mr. Speaker, this last ditch attempt to distract from our reform 
efforts is as transparent as it is desperate. Fortunately, the end of 
this conference is in sight, and the reforms needed to ensure the 
defined benefits system remains viable for generations to come are 
nearly in place.
  I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the motion to instruct, and 
reject this attempt to obscure our progress.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to 
the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews).
  Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding. I rise in 
support of his motion.
  I want to try to explain, Mr. Speaker, to our colleagues what one of 
the issues in Mr. Miller's motion has to do with.
  Let's assume that we have a pension plan that is only 75 percent 
funded; that is to say, it has $75 for every $100 that it needs to meet 
its pension obligations. Under the bill that passed the House, the 
people that run that plan could say the following: The CEO of the 
company could continue to get 100 percent of the benefits that he was 
entitled to under the plan, the wealthiest person in the company. But 
the person who cleans his office at night could have her pension cut.
  Let me say this again. If the plan had $75 for every $100 that it 
needs, under the provision the House passed, the CEO of the company 
gets every nickel that he is entitled to. No cut at all. But the 
custodian who cleans his office at night, or the clerk who types his 
letters, or the person who delivers his documents, could have their 
pension cut considerably.
  Now, this is not right. This is not right. If some employees are 
going to take a cut in their pension, then it seems fair that everyone 
should share equally in that punishment.
  One of the great principles of the American economy is that a rising 
tide lifts all boats. When a company prospers, so does everyone in the 
rank and file, so does every shareholder, so does every investor, one 
would hope. And lots of decisions are predicated upon that principle.
  We want the executives to flourish and prosper, because if they do, 
they will make better decisions for the people who clean the offices 
and type the letters and deliver the documents.
  But the corollary to that principle is, if the boat is sinking, then 
some people can't jump off the boat into a life boat while everybody 
else stands there as the ship goes down. That seems rather fair.
  One might call this the Titanic principle, you know, where the people 
who were in the luxury compartments got to the life boats first, but 
the people locked in steerage sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.
  The Senate has a very different provision. Ninety-seven senators 
voted in favor of this provision; and it said, very simply, the same 
rule that applies to the lady who cleans the office at night should 
apply to the CEO who sits in the office all day long. Ninety-Seven 
senators voted in favor of that provision. Two voted against it.
  Mr. Miller's motion wisely says that this House should go on record 
as saying that is the provision we ought to adopt. Vote ``yes.''
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. I yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich).
  Mr. KUCINICH. This is really about fairness. It is about values.
  I rise in strong support of Congressman Miller's motion to instruct. 
I commend my colleague, Mr. Miller, for his leadership in working to 
ensure that pension reform puts workers first.
  This motion to instruct highlights a number of important provisions 
that make clear the priority of our efforts. It must be workers. 
Pensions are not just investments to workers. To a worker, his or her 
pension is the centerpiece of economic security.

                              {time}  1715

  The promise of that pension becomes more precious as workers move 
closer to their own retirement. It is imperative that our efforts 
protect older workers. This motion to instruct recognizes that 
conversions from traditional defined benefit plans to cash balance 
plans harm older workers. Providing transition protections for older

[[Page 15807]]

workers should not be a choice for employers but a requirement. 
Hardworking employees should not be rewarded for their service with a 
denial of pension benefits. I urge my colleagues to help ensure that 
older workers' pensions are protected.
  This motion to instruct also highlights the importance of equity 
between workers and executives. Under the pension reform bill passed by 
this House, a pension plan that is less than 80 percent funded would 
not be allowed to increase benefits or establish new benefits for its 
workers regardless of the reason for the underfunding. But while worker 
pensions are held stagnant, executive benefits remain unrestricted 
until the plan is less than 60 percent funded. Patently unfair to 
workers. Pension plans are administered and funded by companies, not 
the workers. Workers should not be punished for faulty management of 
plans.
  The past decade is littered with examples of increasing executive pay 
and pensions while worker pension plans were underfunded or even 
terminated. In 2002, U.S. Airways' CEO received a lump sum pension of 
$15 million. Six months following that executive payout, U.S. Airways 
filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy. One eventual outcome of the bankruptcy 
was the termination of the pilots' pension plan. The CEO, $15 million; 
the pilots . . .
  Stories with a similar theme can be shared about United Airlines and 
Delta. Executives receive a protected pension benefit or extra stock 
options, while workers are left with terminated pension plans and a cut 
in benefits. Although this motion to instruct will not restore the 
pensions of those workers already harmed by executive abuse, it will 
make a difference to many others.
  Pension plans do not belong to companies. They belong to workers. 
They are the workers' money and the workers' future. Pensions are the 
property of the workers, and as such, we have a duty to ensure that 
workers' pensions are protected from practices which threaten our 
security.
  I urge my colleagues to support the Miller motion to instruct. I urge 
my colleagues to remember that there are millions of Americans out 
there who are looking to this moment to decide whether we are going to 
stand up for working men and women or we are going to turn them aside 
in order to slaver over the economic advantage that is granted to their 
executives.
  Mr. McKEON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I believe we are nearing the end of the pension reform conference. It 
has been quite a roller coaster ride, indicating the delicate balance 
that we have established to get to the point where we are today.
  I know many of our colleagues are anxious to see work completed on 
this conference report so that improvements to our pension system can 
actually be put in place. As vice chair of this conference committee, I 
share that view. The fact is that in recent days a tremendous amount of 
progress has been made towards completing this conference, and I am 
optimistic that we will produce a finished product that the vast 
majority of our colleagues can and will support. That is what we should 
be spending our time on--completing the work and protecting and 
improving workers' retirement security--not engaging in the partisan 
charade that this motion at its core represents.
  Our goal is and always has been to ensure our defined benefit system 
remains viable for generations to come. This will serve the interests 
of workers, retirees, and taxpayers alike. This motion to instruct does 
not.
  I urge my colleagues to vote ``no.''
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the 
balance of my time.
  Mr. Speaker, my colleague on the other side keeps saying that this is 
somehow a partisan charade to score points. There are just a little 
over 200 Members of the Democratic Party in this Congress, and these 
votes have carried 258, 308, 299, 237. Clearly, there is bipartisan 
agreement that as we write this pension bill, as we deal with pension 
reform, we ought to make an effort to try to deal with the plight of 
these workers in the fairest possible way we can.
  Let us look again quickly at what we are trying to do here. We are 
trying, one, to protect older workers who have a very limited ability 
to gather additional economic resources as they end their work years, 
to make up for a dramatic cut in their pension plans. All we are saying 
is that those workers ought to be protected, those who are 5 years away 
from the pension plan. Not a radical proposal. Not a partisan proposal. 
It passed the Senate 97-2. By an overwhelming bipartisan vote, we have 
asked the conferees to invoke that measure.
  We have also tried to say that those airline pilots that were forced 
to retire at age 60 due to Federal law, a Federal law that we are now 
considering changing to 65, but because of the bankruptcy of the 
company and the dumping of the plan by United and others into the PBGC, 
those pilots ought not to be harmed because they had no ability to 
reach 65 in their employment. The Federal law made them quit, and they 
ought not to be harmed in that situation. They may have never been 
harmed but for 9/11, but for the run up in fuel prices. They didn't do 
anything wrong, but they find themselves taking a double hit through 
the bankruptcy and through the PBGC rules.
  Then we said let us try to save the airline industry. Let us stretch 
this out. For those plans, mind you, they have frozen their pension 
plans. They comply with the requirements of the Senate bill, and we 
have said let us give them time to recover their economic health and 
hopefully save these pension plans. We do not know yet, but again on a 
bipartisan basis overwhelmingly, the House voted to do that.
  Then we said let us make sure that we exhaust all of the remedies 
before we dump these pension plans onto the taxpayers. Let us make sure 
that we have exercised all of the effort, that we have bargained in 
good faith, that we have searched every way to avoid this from becoming 
a taxpayer liability. Again, passing 97-2, the Senate went in that 
direction and we didn't. They refused those amendments to the 
legislation.
  And, finally, the issue of basic fairness, one that so struck the 
people of this Nation when they saw how Enron manipulated the pension 
systems, how they manipulated the stock sales to those pension systems 
by the executives, and, finally, how they manipulated the company into 
the downward spiral of bankruptcy and people lost their entire 
livelihoods.
  This bill says that, as Mr. Kucinich pointed out, if this plan is not 
at least 80 percent funded, you can provide no new benefits to the 
employees no matter what the reason for that underfunding is; but 
unless it is 60 percent underfunded, you can keep providing benefits to 
the executives. There is just a fundamental element of fairness. And 
again I think by over 258 votes, on a bipartisan basis, the House sent 
these instructions to the conferees. This is part of the legislative 
process.
  I am here because this is a privileged motion. We recognize the need 
to communicate from the full House to the conferees on measures that we 
continue to favor as the conference committee goes forward, and we have 
done that. But the fact of the matter is that now it appears, certainly 
from newspaper reports, which I wouldn't know because we have been shut 
out of this conference committee. The Republicans do not conference 
with the Democrats in the House. They do not honor that democratic 
principle. They do not honor that democratic history. So we only know 
what we have been told through the grapevine. We know in talking to the 
Democratic and Republican Senators, and we know a little bit by what we 
read in the press, and it appears that, in fact, in each and every one 
of these points where the House has spoken with an overwhelming voice 
to protect the pensions of workers, of retirees, and of their families, 
that each and every one of these is going to be disregarded by the 
conferees.
  This is a last attempt to try to bring some openness to this 
conference, to try to bring some bipartisan participation to this 
conference committee, and

[[Page 15808]]

to bring the will of the House, which I think in these cases when we 
are hearing about pensions, when you go home and you talk to your 
constituents and you have your town hall meetings, you see how anxious 
people are about their health care benefits, about their retirement 
benefits, about their retirement security.
  Yet somehow those conferees cannot get that message. Maybe they have 
been in Congress too long. Maybe they are insulated from it. Somehow 
they just cannot get it. Well, life outside the Beltway is very 
precarious for a lot of employees and a lot of industries. And the 
question that comes to us is whether or not we are going to make an 
effort to have a pension bill that recognizes the fairness and the 
equity.
  Again, this is not some partisan bill. This is not some bill thought 
up in the last few moments. The fact of the matter is these provisions 
are contained, for the most part, in the Senate bill. We do not ask to 
go beyond that. In the Senate bill that passed the Senate 97-2. And, in 
fact, if we do that, there will be some economic justice for these 
retirees and these workers. There will be some economic fairness for 
these retirees and these workers. And there will be, most importantly, 
some sense of retirement security for millions of Americans that every 
day they pick up the paper and they see that yet another group of 
employees, another company is making a decision about reducing, getting 
rid of, terminating, freezing the pension plans and the health care 
benefits of those individuals.
  We owe them this legislation to deal with them in a fair fashion, in 
an equitable fashion, legislation that can increase the retirement 
security of these families.
  I ask for an ``aye'' vote on the motion to instruct.
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of Mr. 
Miller's motion to call our colleagues' attention to provisions in the 
Senate bill S. 1783, provisions that aim to ensure the very best for 
our older workers. These provisions prohibit discrimination against 
older workers by eliminating the ``wearaway'' of older worker benefits. 
They also provide fair rules to protect workers' pensions in 
conversions of traditional pension plans to cash balance pension plans. 
In a recent study, the GAO found that, without these transition 
protections, almost all workers could lose up to 50 percent of their 
expected pension benefits in a cash balance conversion.
  The Senate provisions also entail language that will ensure that 
airline pilots are protected from unfair cuts to their pension benefits 
because of the FAA's mandatory retirement rules. Currently, FAA 
regulations require pilots to retire at age 60. The PBGC treats age 60 
as an early retirement, and cuts pilots guaranteed benefits as a 
result. The Senate provisions would require the PBGC to treat age 60 as 
the normal retirement age for pilots and adjust their guaranteed 
benefits accordingly.
  Under the current House bill, workers see benefit restrictions when a 
pension plan falls below 80 percent funding. Executives, on the other 
hand, only see limited benefit restrictions much later--at less than 60 
percent funding. The Senate bill achieves greater parity than the House 
bill in how workers and executives are treated. Over the last several 
years, we have seen repeated cases where executives have protected or 
even enhanced their own golden parachutes, while cutting or eliminating 
workers' pensions. It is time for these unfair practices to end.
  The provisions in the Senate bill will help see that this happens and 
ensure that America's older workers are treated fairly and with 
respect. There are few things worse than working hard for 40 years or 
more only to see one's well-being in retirement being compromised by 
inadequacies and inefficiencies in pension policy. We have some 
retirement-aged folks amongst us, and I encourage my colleagues to 
imagine it was our pension up for debate right now. Perhaps it should 
be if we do act to protect others'. I therefore urge all of my 
colleagues to join Mr. Miller and take the Senate provisions seriously 
and support them accordingly.
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the 
balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Without objection, the previous question is 
ordered on the motion to instruct.
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion to instruct 
offered by the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller).
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the noes appeared to have it.
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the 
yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further 
proceedings on this question will be postponed.

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