Democrats Introduce Revamped Oil Spill Legislation

By Anna Cameron

House Democrats introduced revised legislation on Wednesday to reform operations and oversight of offshore drilling following last year’s oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.), Ranking Member of the Natural Resources Committee, and fellow Democrats Reps. George Miller (D-Calif.) and Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), held a press conference to speak about the bill. Entitled the Implementing the Recommendations of the BP Oil Spill Commission Act, the legislation builds upon last year’s House response bill to include the recommendations of the President’s commission created to investigate the spill.

“Republicans voted against this bill last year, many of them arguing at the time that they wanted to hear from the President’s bipartisan commission before taking up legislation,” said Markey. “Now the commission has spoken and the question is, will the Republicans now support tougher safety regulations for offshore drilling, or will they defend the oil companies from the reforms that the bipartisan commission has recommended?”

As recommended by the commission, the main components of the bill would strengthen the regulatory and oversight capabilities of the Department of the Interior, eliminate the spill liability cap on oil compaies and dedicate the fines levied on BP and other companies to restoring the Gulf.

Referring to hearings held by the Energy and Commerce Committee, Waxman said, “We learned that the problem was not too much government regulation, but the lack of of effective federal regulation and oversight.”

To ensure greater accountability, the legislation would also require well designs and blowout preventers to be safety certified by third party inspectors selected by federal regulators, rather than the oil companies themselves. 

“It’s too late to stop the explosion and blowout on the Deepwater Horizon, but with this legislation we can hold the appropriate parties accountable and make sure that this type of catastrophic blowout never happens again,” Waxman said.