David Thomas: “Mr. Speaker, I find it interesting that the last two speakers who both indicated that they were going to vote against…”

“Mr. Speaker, I find it interesting that the last two speakers who both indicated that they were going to vote against the funding resolution are freshmen and therefore they have had no experience in what the Congress has looked like when their party was in the majority. I appreciate the gentlewoman from Michigan indicating that she is working hard in the Committee on Science, and there is a 14-percent increase. The record shows the Committee on Science has increased 3 percent. It is 3 percent for the 105th Congress; that is 1 percent a year. The cost of living, which is certainly not automatic, and although the chairmen will probably vote where it is appropriate for a cost of living for the employees is about 2.3 percent. So it is obvious that the employees working for that committee will not within the budget increase find enough money to cover a COLA. But what I would really like to remind the freshmen Members on the minority side is that when their party was in the majority the most recent Congress, being the 103d Congress, spent $223 million on staff and the committees.”