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UPDATE: House Dems pass Trial-Lawyer-Enhancement Act, Vote DOWN Patient Protection AmendmentsBy Nick, Section News
Well, it's official. Andy Dillon's majority in the state House voted today to approve three bills allowing ambulance chasers to run life-science and pharmecutical companies right out of Michigan.
If you're a regular reader, you're aware that the House was looking to repeal Michigan's FDA defense law and permit trial lawyers to sue companies for things they did under the old set of rules, penalizing them for following the letter of the law. I won't bore everyone with another rehash of the issue. We've covered it pretty thoroughly. If you're just joining us, you can read all about it HERE. The full House held their vote today and Dillon rammed the measures through. As Minority Leader DeRoche's office put it: Trial Lawyers 1, Michigan's Economy 0. Read on...
More surprising than the Dems taking care of their special interest buddies was their rejection of a set of amendments that would have enhanced patient and consumer protections.
State Reps. Tonya Schuitmaker, Tom Casperson and Bruce Caswell introduced amendments allowing victims to receive more of any settlement money they might win in court, creating a victims' fund from attorney fees and allowing courts to impose sanctions on trial lawyers and law firms caught ambulance chasing and initiating frivolous lawsuits among others. Each amendment went down to defeat at the hands of the reckless Dem. majority. Not only is the legislation they approved crippling to Michigan's life-science industry, but by voting down the amendments each member went on record contradicting all of their statements claiming this legislation was about patients. Clearly it was not. "We couldn't have chosen a worse time to send this kind of message to one of the few industries in Michigan that is actually growing," said Caswell, "Despite the impending loss of jobs at Pfizer, the hundreds of new start-ups in the life-science industry over the past ten years have been a silver lining in an otherwise gloomy cloud over Michigan's economy. Today's vote puts those gains at risk at a time when we can't afford to be taking any more steps backward." At the very least, Representative. This is bad news, for sure. For those of you who may be wondering, after the CitPat's reaction to Rep. Simpson's vote down in Jackson in yesterday's edition... well, he didn't take their advice. He voted for the bills. And since enquiring minds almost certainly want to know, the following is a list of all of the Reps who voted for the bills!
Frank Accavitti
UPDATE: House Dems pass Trial-Lawyer-Enhancement Act, Vote DOWN Patient Protection Amendments | 1 comment (1 topical, 0 hidden)
UPDATE: House Dems pass Trial-Lawyer-Enhancement Act, Vote DOWN Patient Protection Amendments | 1 comment (1 topical, 0 hidden)
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