[Page: H1988]---
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the gentleman from Guam (Mr. UNDERWOOD) is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. UNDERWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I speak again on the issue of the implementation of a commercial study, the A-76 program, which basically is designed to outsource a number of jobs in my home island of Guam.
I rise again to point out some very serious difficulties with this process, and point out to the Members and especially the Members of the Committee on Armed Services that these kinds of problems which we are experiencing in Guam will inevitably be experienced by everyone as they undergo this A-76 process.
Yesterday on Guam, Raytheon Technical Services commenced their contract with the U.S. Navy for base operation support functions. Approximately 800 Federal civil service workers were laid off, and most of them were immediately rehired by Raytheon under the so-called right of first refusal to perform the very same jobs as they did last week, only they will be paid a salary of 40 to 60 percent less.
The Navy has told us that the wages that the contractor is required to pay are based on a ``prevailing wage determination,'' as is calculated by the U.S. Department of Labor. These are calculated by a prevailing wage survey. This survey is a composite of job-specific wage rates by industry in a particular community. They do not, however, account for the price of local consumer goods and foodstuffs which must be purchased in order to survive in that community, so Federal jobs also include a cost-of-living allowance that makes up this difference.
[Time: 19:15]
The private contractor is not required to pay this. In attempting to comprehend the situation on Guam between the high cost of consumables and the depressed prevailing wage rates, we spoke with the Prevailing Wage section of the Guam Department of Labor. We were informed that the Guam Department of Labor is responsible for the wage determination for foreign laborers under the H-2 program and is based on survey results done on Guam and reflective of local conditions.
Furthermore, the Guam Department of Labor noted that the wages established as a result of these surveys have complied with the requirements of the Davis-Bacon Act. The Guam Department of Labor is aware that the Navy contract with Raytheon is neither in line with Guam Department of Labor prevailing wage, nor mainland wage standards. Guam DOL has said that the wage survey for the Navy contract was not done on island and thus questions the survey's methodology.
Mr. Speaker, the question now begs where did the Navy get this wage data from? Well, one conclusion that we can draw from these depressed wages is that they pick the lowest possible salaries as determined from a whole range of areas of unofficial wage-study areas.
Now, I provide an example. We will use a real live Raytheon job offer against similar positions on Guam, using the Guam DOL prevailing wage survey, again a survey that is done under U.S. DOL supervision and is intended for foreign workers. For administration and accounting services, under the Navy service contract an accounting clerk is now being offered a wage of $5.80 an hour, compared with the Guam prevailing wage rate of $8.48 an hour. For a data entry operator, Raytheon has offered $11.86 an hour versus the Guam prevailing wage of $13.25 an hour.
Mr. Speaker, this is outrageous. Not only does it seem that the Navy was utilizing faulty data of an unknown source, but the Navy is taking advantage of the fact that the U.S. Department of Labor does not have sufficient oversight capabilities to enforce the requirements made on the Navy under the Services Contracting Act.
In fact, under the provisions of the Services Contracting Act, the Navy is required to request the U.S. Department of Labor to conduct a wage determination by filing a notice with the U.S. DOL for such a survey, and I believe that the U.S. Navy has violated this requirement and thus created an environment whereby wage busting could occur.
Let me just summarize here. What has happened on Guam has happened in other communities, perhaps unbeknownst to those communities, and will continue to happen, and that is if the Navy is allowed to compute their own prevailing wages apart from the actual wages in that community, they will continue to not only pay the people less than they would have under
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This has happened on Guam, and it is ironic that if one was a foreign worker coming to Guam, and this disincentive that is created under the Guam prevailing wage one would be getting more money today than they would under this Navy-induced contract with Raytheon. It is an outrage.
I call again upon the Department of the Navy and the Pentagon to halt this contract, to call for an Inspector General investigation, and I call for a congressional hearing on this matter.
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