Dave Camp: “I yield myself the balance of my time. I would just say, Mr. Speaker, that well before the Labor Action Plan was signed…”

“I yield myself the balance of my time. I would just say, Mr. Speaker, that well before the Labor Action Plan was signed by President Obama and President Santos, Colombia had raised their labor standards and aided union members in the exercise of their rights well before the action plan ever occurred. Colombia now has implemented all eight of the ILO core conventions--six more than the United States. The statute of limitations for murder was raised in 2009 from 20 to 30 years. The minimum prison sentence was raised from 13 to 25 years and the maximum was raised from 25 to 40. The authority to declare the legality of strikes is now in the purview of the judiciary, not the executive branch, which depoliticizes these decisions and shows the transition and progress that Colombia has made in this area. Employers no longer have a unilateral right to force a strike to arbitration. The constitution reforms in 2004 shortened by 75 percent the time it takes to prosecute a homicide case. As I mentioned earlier, the murder rate in Colombia against union members has declined by 85 percent since 2002. As my Democrat colleagues in support of the Colombian Trade Agreement have said, the Labor Action Plan is the most stringent Labor Action Plan anywhere in the world that has ever occurred. With regard to the cooperative issue, the U.S.…”