William Hughes: “I rise in support of House Concurrent Resolution 218, the fiscal 1995 budget resolution. I wish to commend Chairman Sabo…”

“I rise in support of House Concurrent Resolution 218, the fiscal 1995 budget resolution. I wish to commend Chairman Sabo and his colleagues on the Budget Committee for their outstanding work in developing this measure and bringing it to the floor. This resolution continues the progress we started last year with the adoption of the 5-year budget agreement initiated by President Clinton. That plan provided for some $496 billion in deficit reduction over 5 years, more than half of which comes from hard cuts in every category of Federal spending. That budget agreement has been enormously successful to date. Indeed, the budget deficit was $300 billion when President Bush left office in 1992. It was $180 billion at the end of 1993. While that is still a lot of red ink, clearly we are heading in the right direction. The budget resolution we are considering today continues us along the deficit reduction glidepath. It conforms to the spending caps for discretionary spending which were established under last year's budget agreement. In so doing, it actually reduces discretionary spending for the first time since 1969. For those who believe, as I do, that the best way to balance the budget is to cut spending, this is certainly welcome news. Indeed, under this resolution, the deficit will fall to $175 billion in fiscal 1995. That is some $115 billion less than the deficit was just 3 years ago.”