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House Passes New Terror Insurance Bill By Bill Swindell WASHINGTON — House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D-Mass.) said Wednesday he would not hold up final passage of legislation that would renew the federal government's terrorism risk insurance program in the face of the Senate's continuing take-it-or-leave-it stance with its version (see GSN, Oct. 18). Frank's admission makes it much more likely the House will clear the Senate bill next week, right before the program expires Dec. 31, to the relief of the insurance and commercial real estate industry that had been lobbying hard for a lengthy extension. Frank had threatened that the House would only pass a three-month extension to provide time for negotiations with the Senate over differences between the two chambers' versions. The Senate passed its bill by voice vote Nov. 16. “Members have asked … and in the end we may just have to accept what the Senate has sent us. That's possible. We have preserved the option to do that,” Frank said. But he did not want give up so soon, thus the House passed by a 303-116 vote Wednesday a slimmed-down version of legislation the House originally approved Sept. 19. The revised House bill would reauthorize the program for seven years, like the Senate-passed version. The original House bill extended the program for 15 years. It also would not contain language requiring carriers to make available coverage for a nuclear, biological, chemical or radiological attack; the provision was included in the earlier House version. But Frank kept some items in the original bill, hoping to sway senators, most notably Banking ranking member Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) to accept at least a few provisions. That includes language expanding the program to group life coverage, which life insurers support, and lowering the program's trigger from $100 million to $50 million, important for small carriers. The changes have not altered the political dynamic. The White House threatened to veto the revised bill. “[The Senate bill] was unanimously approved by the Senate and has the backing of the Administration as well as strong industry support. Senator Shelby believes it has the best chance of becoming law before the program expires at the end of the month,” said a Shelby spokesman. House Financial Services ranking member Spencer Bachus (R-Ala.) said during the debate that Frank should have just moved the Senate bill even though he supported a provision the Massachusetts lawmaker was pushing in negotiations, language that would tighten rules life insurers must follow in offering coverage for those who travel to potentially dangerous countries. “The Senate has said they are not going to include group life. So why put a provision on about group life when the Senate already said it is not going to include group life?” Bachus noted. Frank replied that his stance was as much for defending the House's prerogative in legislative negotiations as it was for policy concerns. “I don't think we can have a de facto amendment to the House rules that put the Senate in charge of what we could discuss,” Frank said.
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