Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of the FY 2008 Labor-HHS Conference Report which — together with this year’s Military Construction-Veterans Affairs spending bill — announces an important new direction regarding the nation’s priorities.
We start with our most basic investment: education. Today’s Conference Report increases education funding by $4.5 billion over the President’s request — including an additional $254 million for Head Start so more children can access a high quality early childhood education; $600 million more for No Child Left Behind to improve teacher quality, enhance after-school programming and deploy 21st century classroom technology; an $800 million boost for special education; and a new $2 billion investment for higher education which will enable us to significantly increase the current value of the maximum Pell Grant from $4310 to $4925. Additionally, I am very pleased that the final Conference Report contains $12 million for Teach for America, one of our nation’s premier teacher training programs.
Because we are competing in a rapidly changing global economy, and because education is in truth a lifelong process, this conference report also makes responsible investments in job training and vocational education — $609 million over the President’s request for workforce development; another $606 million for vocational education; and $98 million on top of the President’s request for Job Corps and the vital training, placement and support services it provides.
On health, today’s legislation wisely rejects the President’s proposed $480 million cut at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in favor of a $1.4 billion increase over the President’s budget so that the NIH can continue its cutting-edge research into deadly scourges like cancer, Alzheimer’s and heart disease. This additional funding — representing the cost of just three days in Iraq — will fund over 1400 more research grants into these and other life-threatening illnesses. Furthermore, in an effort to address the plight of the nation’s 47 million uninsured, this legislation enhances health care access by investing $1.5 billion into community health centers, state health care access initiatives and high risk insurance pools. Together, these investments will serve over 1.5 million citizens without health care coverage in the coming year.
Finally, Madam Speaker, Sunday is Veterans Day. With our nation at war, this conference report honors our brave men and women in uniform by proposing the largest single increase for the Department of Veterans Affairs in the institution’s 77-year history. The $43.1 billion this legislation appropriates will enable us to provide quality care to 5.8 million patients, add 1800 processors to tackle the outstanding backlog of 400,000 claims, and invest in needed treatment for increasingly prevalent conditions like Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). It is the least we can do — and now is the time for us to do it.
Madam Speaker, these two bills both passed the House with strong, bipartisan majorities. Together, they set the right priorities for America. They comply with our five-year balanced budget plan. And they deserve our support today. I yield back the balance of my time.