Financing Next Big Hurdle Facing Senate Asbestos B

Washington, DC, June 29--Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter said he was "raising hell" with companies to try to get them to spell out who would pay what to finance the $140 billion asbestos compensation fund bill before the Senate. The financing is one of the thornier issues he needs to resolve in order to get a Senate floor vote on the bill next month, Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter said. Specter also said he would meet insurers who have opposed the bill, and billionaire investor Warren Buffett, on Wednesday as he tries to win more support for the legislation. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist wants to bring the bill up for a vote "as soon as we have the major issues resolved," Specter said in a Capitol Hill hallway. Asbestos was widely used for fireproofing and insulation until the 1970s. Scientists have linked inhaled fibers to cancer, and injury claims have bankrupted dozens of companies. Specter's bill to halt the lawsuits and pay claims from a fund was approved by the Judiciary Committee in May. Companies facing the lawsuits and their insurers would finance the fund. But some critics say they won't back the bill on the Senate floor without knowing details of the financing. Specter said he asked companies to give the information confidentially to a small group of senators -- the same procedure used for delicate issues of national security. "The allocation issue is absolutely brutal," the Pennsylvania Republican said. "I was on the phone yesterday with the manufacturers. We just have to have a better idea of where the money is coming from." The companies have not yet produced the information he wants, he said, "but I'm raising hell about it." Under the bill, asbestos manufacturers and other companies that acquired liabilities through mergers, would have to pay $90 billion over 30 years according to a complicated formula that considers past expenditures on asbestos litigation. Lawmakers say companies can look at the formula and figure their contributions. But companies have been reluctant to discuss what they would expect to pay ahead of the bill's passage, saying this would make them targets of more lawsuits. Insurers don't have a formula in the bill for their $46 billion in contributions. Specter said insurance executives who opposed the bill would see him on Wednesday, and so would Buffett. The billionaire investor's Berkshire Hathaway Inc was on a list of companies that wrote to Specter months ago opposing the bill.

Related Topics:Shaw Industries Group, Inc.

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