Howard Berman: “Mr. Chairman, we are dealing here probably with the only amendment I think on the status of repose. When I saw the…”

“Mr. Chairman, we are dealing here probably with the only amendment I think on the status of repose. When I saw the language as it came out of the two committees and was reintroduced in this new bill, H.R. 1075, I said, well, this is not a bad effort. We are federalizing the product liability law in this one title. We will not even talk about what we are doing in the rest of the bill. We are providing the manufacturers with a certainty in terms of the amount of years. We are exempting it based on an amendment that the gentleman from Illinois, the chairman, accepted in committee for express warranties. If we could just get the Bryant amendment, to deal with a manufacturer who intentionally conceals problems with his product. We have a provision in the bill that says this subsection shall apply only if the court determines that the claimant has received or would be eligible to receive full compensation from any source for medical expense losses. I thought with the addition of the Bryant amendment, which the Committee on Rules prevented him from offering, you could have a reasonable statute of repose as part of this federalization of the product liabilities scheme.”