Floor Statement Of Sen. Patrick Leahy
 On Amendment 5123
To The FY 2007 Military Construction Appropriations Bill
November 14, 2006

Mr. President, I am a pleased to be a cosponsor of Amendment 5123 offered by Senators Collins and Feingold.  This bipartisan amendment would extend the life of the Office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) and restore the bipartisan agreement made regarding the termination of the SIGIR in the Senate-passed FY 2007 Defense Authorization bill. 

The Collins-Feingold amendment is necessary to undo the damage of a veiled provision inserted in the FY 2007 Defense Authorization conference report by the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee that terminates the SIGIR by an artificial date that has no basis in the progress of reconstruction projects.

This amendment will sustain the valuable work of the Special IG to monitor, audit, and inspect funds made available for assistance for Iraq in both the Iraq Relief and Reconstruction Fund and in other important accounts, which totals nearly $32 billion. 

The amendment will restore the formula for calculating the SIGIR’s termination to 10 months after 80 percent of the funds appropriated for Iraq reconstruction have been expended. While I strongly support this amendment, I believe the SIGIR’s authority should extend as long as necessary to ensure that the billions of dollars appropriated for Iraq’s reconstruction be granted adequate oversight. 

It is important that the Special IG auditors continue their work as long as taxpayer funds are being spent on reconstruction efforts.  Thus aspects of this amendment –including the 80 percent expended trigger and the exclusion of future Iraq reconstruction appropriations – will need to be revisited in the coming months.  I intend to work with other Senators to ensure that all future Iraq reconstruction funds are subject to the continued oversight of the SIGIR. 

Wasteful spending and profiteering are especially offensive in wartime, and our soldiers and the American people deserve more oversight of how their tax dollars are being spent in Iraq, not less oversight.

The Special Inspector General’s work to date has been enormously valuable to the Executive Branch, to Congress, and to American taxpayers.  The SIGIR has completed more than 55 audit reports, issued more than 165 recommendations, and seized more than $13 million in assets.  What the SIGIR has uncovered proves the need for the work of this office to continue.

The SIGIR’s investigations have sent American reconstruction officials to jail on bribery and conspiracy charges, exposed numerous instances of colossal mismanagement in construction projects, and uncovered case after case of waste, fraud and abuse at the taxpayers’ expense.  In fewer than three years, the Special IG’s operations have resulted in savings to the U.S. government and the taxpayers of more than $24 million and uncovered considerable wasteful or fraudulent spending. 

The Collins-Feingold amendment will abolish the artificial and arbitrary termination date inserted by one member of the other body and extend the SIGIR’s charter with the recognition that the office has performed crucial work, with much more remaining to be done. 

I appreciate the work of Senators Collins and Feingold in offering this commonsense amendment and urge its adoption by the Senate.