Marty Walsh: “Reclaiming my time, we can deal with this before the 2006 budget is implemented. We have time. It is June. We moved…”

“Reclaiming my time, we can deal with this before the 2006 budget is implemented. We have time. It is June. We moved expeditiously to get the bill passed. We did that. We now have new information and we have to respond to that. And the questions I can frankly say were aggressive and thorough, and the response from the Veterans' Administration, while complete, at least we believe complete at this time, was not as thorough as we would like. And we asked questions, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards) and I and other members of the subcommittee have asked questions. We want to get at what exactly is the anticipated shortfall for 2006. We want to make sure that this projected deficit for 2005 is responded to. That there is no diminution of care or quality of care in our veterans hospitals and that is our responsibility. That is the proper venue for this debate. Not on the foreign operations bill. We will have time to respond to it. We have had discussions with OMB and with the Veterans' Administration. We will not rest until we resolve this difference of what is needed to meet the needs of our veterans. But I assure the House and Members here today that we will get to the bottom of this, we will get the proper resolution. And if additional funds are needed, and I believe they are, we will find them.”