Louise Slaughter: “I rise today to agree that the United States does indeed need a coherent, comprehensive energy plan. The events of the…”

“I rise today to agree that the United States does indeed need a coherent, comprehensive energy plan. The events of the summer of 2001 clearly illustrate this. The raging power prices and the rolling blackouts in California and the historic implosion of Enron vividly showed America that our energy policies are broken and need to be fixed. A few weeks ago, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ruled that widespread manipulation and misconduct by Enron and 30 other energy companies and the failures of deregulation of the energy industry caused the energy crisis that plagued California in 2000 and 2001. Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, the bill does not fix what is broken. H.R. 6 does not address any of the lessons learned from the California energy crisis. The legislation does not provide the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission with any antifraud authority. It does not criminalize the legal abuses by energy corporations that contributed to the California energy crisis. Instead of providing stronger protections for consumers, the bill would repeal the Public Utility Holding Company Act, which protects both consumers and investors. In fact, some have argued that proper enforcement of the Public Utility Holding Company Act could have prevented the Enron disaster. The bill fails consumers, but it benefits the giant energy corporations.”