Don Nickles: “I appreciate my colleague's statement, but I totally disagree. Some of us have argued for contract sanctity, but we…”

“I appreciate my colleague's statement, but I totally disagree. Some of us have argued for contract sanctity, but we haven't been totally successful, I might add. Almost all those contracts would begin, if not by October 1, certainly by January 1 of the year 2003. So maybe there are a few more months. But under collective bargaining agreements, if you read the language on page 174, it is not until the contract or the agreement terminates. And then the second part of it says that even if they comply, it shall not count as a termination. You could have collective bargaining agreements exempt under this provision indefinitely for 12 years. They may never terminate the agreement. They may continue rolling it over, so it is never terminated. It might be readjusted; it might be renegotiated; but it is never terminated. Are we going to take 30 million Americans and say: You are not covered by these patient protections? Some of these contracts will last 10 years, 15 years. The average contract I was looking at had a schedule of 5 to 6 years. One I mentioned does not expire until the year 2010. If they renegotiate it between now and next year, the duration of the contract will be exempt. We are telling everybody else in the private sector: Get your act in order, and by the end of next year you have to have these new patient protections, oh, unless you are a member of a collective bargaining agreement. This is not the only exemption we found.…”