Mr. Chairman, I rise today in opposition to the DC/Labor-HHS Appropriations Conference Report. There are many reasons to oppose this measure. Among the worst of the provisions contained in this conference report is the irresponsible across-the-board 1% cut in discretionary spending fashioned by the House Republican leadership.

It is the worst kind of cynicism to claim that a 1% across-the-board cut will correct waste and fraud in government programs. I’m strongly opposed to cutting the funding for veterans’ medical care just approved by Congress. The Majority Whip has issued a press release that claims the cut in veterans’ medical care funding he is recommending would not affect health care for America’s veterans. Veterans know better. You can’t cut health care funding without cutting health care.

Congressman DeLay sent a press release to the leadership of major veterans service organizations defending the 1.4% cut in appropriations he originally supported, which affected veterans, among other discretionary programs. Let me state that three years of straight-line funding for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has left the agency struggling to meet the increasing costs of medical care for the growing number of enrolled veterans it treats.

Now the Republican leadership claims a $190 million cut in veterans’ medical care funding would do no harm. They maintain these funds can be squeezed out of the budget and be found in ‘mismanagement and waste’. What the Republican leadership fails to acknowledge is the tremendous changes VA has already made to be more efficient. In the last few years, VA has closed thousands of beds, eliminated thousands of staff positions, and strengthened many of their auditing systems.

House Democrats have strongly supported proposals all year that would have added sums ranging from $2 to $3 billion to the President’s initial proposal for veterans’ medical care. Indeed we have all worked hard to improve funding for veterans. Veterans service organizations have called on Congress to appropriate up to $3 billion more than the Administration’s original budget proposal for veterans’ health care. Now many veterans service organizations have vehemently denounced the Republican leadership’s proposed across-the-board cut. I quote from a letter signed by the executive directors of AMVETS, Disabled American Veterans, Paralyzed Veterans of America, and the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the U.S regarding these cuts: "It seems disingenuous at best for Congress to recognize a problem in funding for veterans health care, provide the dollars with one hand to help solve that problem, and then take dollars away with the other. No one is fooled by this budget slight-of-hand."

Mr. Chairman, no one is going to be fooled by this belated and disingenuous concern about government inefficiency. I urge my colleagues to vote no on this abrogation of responsibility. Vote no on this Conference Report.

It is already evident VA will struggle, even to deal with the unprecedented increase Congress has enacted and the President has signed into law. How will this affect the VA health care system? In many parts of the country, veterans must wait up to six months just to see a primary care doctor. VA has also unraveled mental health and long-term care programs which were once hallmarks of the VA system. There are now even complaints that VA’s highly-regarded special emphasis programs for which there is supposedly Congressional protection -- such as spinal cord injury and blind rehabilitation -- are under attack."

VA has done much to streamline its services in recent years. Over five years, VA has reduced its workforce by almost 10%, closed hundreds of beds throughout the system, reduced its inpatient census by almost 30% and eliminated 37% of its inpatient treatments per year. It has integrated or consolidated 50 medical centers. In testimony before the Veterans’ Affairs Committee this April, four Veterans Integrated Service Network (VISN) directors, commenting on the proposed future efficiency-derived savings, concurred that "all the low-hanging fruit has been picked." Savings available to the system in the future, the directors said, will be harder fought and more disruptive.

The Republican Leadership has contended that VA could absorb further cuts "without having any effect on health care to veterans," citing figures from studies that were challenged earlier this year. For example, The Majority Whip’s release contended VA could save a million dollars a day by eliminating some of its overhead in capital assets. But whether savings of this magnitude could be realized in the immediate future without significantly uprooting current VA programs is highly questionable. Even without the Republican Budget cuts, "there isn’t enough money in the budget now to tear down or renovate under-utilized buildings, let alone to replace them with new, modern, smaller clinics. Any savings here will require investment, not magic, and will not come quickly."

Likewise, DeLay’s release pointed to a report suggesting $17 million is lost each year in fraudulent or improper workers compensation claims. Actually, testimony at the March 24 Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations hearing demonstrated that VA’s workers compensation costs are not unusual, and that the answer is in heading off injuries and helping employees with rehabilitation. In fact, VA has been cutting these costs since 1994, and is completing automation of its claims system for better management, but savings are already part of the FY 2000 budget.