Federal Information Systems Safeguards Act of 2016

Floor Speech

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Mr. BUCK. I thank the gentleman for the opportunity to speak on this important legislation.

Mr. Chair, our Federal Government relies on the contributions of civil servants to run Federal agencies and to faithfully execute our laws. We place significant responsibility into the hands of these executive branch employees. Others still are placed in senior management roles where the impacts of their performance and competency are felt throughout the agencies and by those citizens who interact with them. We expect Federal employees to run the government efficiently and fairly; so we should treat them the same way. That is what this bill does.

When a typical employee is hired for the civil service, he begins in a probationary period, during which time the employee can be relieved of his duties if he fails to perform well. After the probationary period, the employee receives greater protection from being fired, even if he is underperforming. This bill extends the probationary period of employees in both the competitive civil service and the Senior Executive Service from 1 year to 2 years. If the employee requires training or licensing, the probationary period begins when training and licensing are complete.

This extended probationary period gives us time to assess the skills of government employees. If an employee isn't up to the task he or she has been assigned, it is unfair to everyone else who is working hard or competently in that agency to retain the underperforming individual. Moreover, the morale of Federal agencies depends on their having strong teams with strong employees. Anyone who has run an office knows that one bad apple can drag the whole team down.

That is why this bill is so important. We need strong teams working in the Federal Government, and our current Federal employees deserve competent team members. Only then will our bureaucracy be more efficient and better able to serve the American taxpayer, because, ultimately, taxpayers pay the salaries of our Federal employees. For the sake of the taxpayer, we must create a culture of accountability and fairness in our Federal hiring practices.

I urge my colleagues to support this commonsense legislation.

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