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We don’t want to keep everyone here because of the weather but we have some concerns that
obviously we tried to express today at the microphone. The bill has some problems in
it; not only are we opposed to the content but the bill itself has some drafting problems
that need to be addressed. But more than that I think the most important thing from our
perspective is that we are convinced that there’s a way to do a referendum so that
the public can have a voice in this. This whole sessions has been about stifling
debate and stifling the opposition and we hear, and its hard for us to understand how
little people know about it outside 465 but when you actually get outside of 465 its amazing
how misunderstood this issue is. It will have a huge impact on people and their livelihoods
in the future; we think it will have a very negative impact on working families in the
future and perhaps the economy of all of Indiana for perhaps years to come. So we think the
people ought to have an opportunity figure this out and to have a voice in it. So we’ll
continue to press for a referendum but my question is what’s all the rush? Why are
we hurrying? And for goodness sake, there’s no apparent reason why the implementation
of this legislation is set for basically March 14th.
Yeah and I guess the other thing I would add is, you know, we had some very serious amendments
that should have been completely and thoroughly debated. For example, on the amendment which
Senator Simpson talked about which questioned the need for an emergency effectiveness date
in the bill, I didn’t hear one person tell us why.
No one answered the question. We’re putting forth serious issues that
the public want to know about and yet no one came forward, no proponent of the right to
work legislation to explain why there is an emergency clause in there. There were several
other issues that were pushed. Senator Tallian’s motion which would say that if, okay if we
have right to work but you as a non member asked for the union’s assistance in a grievance
procedure you should pay some fair fee for doing that; basically, voted down without
debate. I mean why isn’t that a valid fairness issue that should be considered in this bill
if it’s going forward? It just sort of seemed like our amendments weren’t being taken
seriously by the opponents and that their sole purpose was “Let’s get this over.
Let’s get out of here.” These are serious issues that deserve to have serious debate.
I think that’s a very good point. The debate today was totally lacking, the debate was
one sided. We had to get up and question our own people just to extend the debate because
they, you know the arrogance of power is stifling in this chamber. They are so disrespectful
to not just us as people but also to the people we represent and to the issue that they wouldn’t
even come up to the microphone to justify their no votes. They go to caucus, they take
a caucus bind and that’s it! They have a few errant children over there but for the
most part everything’s decided before we even get in the chamber so no one discussed
the real issues of the legislation and we were trying, seriously, to offer some improvements.
I have to admit my amendment was a little facetious but I was trying to lighten the
load a little bit. But for the most part, we worked very *** those amendments and
we were very serious about them and there is no interest by these folks to amend this
bill or to take any input from anybody else other than whomever it is, the national right
to work committee, or whomever it is that’s funding this organized effort oin their part
to pass this legislation. And, I have a question for all of you that
I hope you will take out of this room and get it answered somehow. Who is paying for
all the ads that they’re running against the nice, hardworking, dedicated legislators
who are doing their job in the best way they know how? Who is paying for those TV ads?
Somebody’s springing for it and somebody needs to demand that we get an answer to that
question.