Political Quotes

“First, let me speak as someone who opposed, actively, the NAFTA agreement and led the effort in this House in opposition to CAFTA. This is, in terms of worker rights, the opposite of NAFTA and CAFTA. What this does is to embody the basic international worker rights enforceable in the trade agreement. Peru was the breakthrough, and Panama continues along that pioneering path. Secondly, on Panama, why are we here? Panama acted to change its labor laws before we voted, as was true for Peru. We pointed out the deficiencies in their laws and I discussed them with the previous administration in Panama. But neither it nor the Bush administration was willing to make sure action occurred. {time} 1510 Now those changes have been made as to companies less than 2 years. Those changes have been made in terms of the economic processing zones, and they have prohibited bypassing unions by direct negotiations with non-unionized workers--unfortunately, not true in Colombia. Look, on the tax haven, they signed the TIEA. We asked them to do that, and that's precisely what they have done. In terms of investment, this bill strengthens the present status quo in terms of investment protections for the United States communities. So, in a word, we have a bill before us that meets the requirements that we set out when we said to the Bush administration, we will not take up Panama until changes have been made.…”