Processing 25 percent of claims in six months is about 156 claims a week.

Essentially, they are being litigated to death, which is absolutely unacceptable, just unacceptable.

I recently supported Senator Grassley's attempt to move administration of Part D from the DOE to the DOL.

The people Congress wanted to help deserved so much better than they got.

I'd like to thank Chairman Dominici for holding this hearing today on the implementation of the Energy Employees Occupational Illnesses Compensation Program Act.

Well, how can you get the claims processed with no understanding on the other end as to how you are going to make the payment?

Is the DOE defending its physicians panel determinations when they are challenged by insurance companies, and if not why not?

I think certainly Senator Bunning and myself are in total agreement that it is not working, we have got to figure out a way to fix it.

I appreciate that. Thank you.

The findings of the Hays Group further reinforce the need to move claims processing from the Department of Energy to the Department of Labor.

This amendment is intended to address one of the two major failures in the implementation of the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Act.

This goes back to our discussion about resolving the willing payor issue.