Roby: Passage of Student Loan Fix Shows Congress Can Get Things Done

Press Release

Passage of a commonsense plan to address the spike in student loan rates and get the government out of the business of setting rates shows how Congress can work together to solve problems Americans face, U.S. Representative Martha Roby (R-AL) said Wednesday.

"I'm glad Senate Democrats finally agreed that the best way to address the student loan issue was with a long-term, market-based solution that takes the federal government out of the business of setting loan interest rates," Rep. Roby said. "This didn't need to be a partisan issue, and I'm pleased that common sense ultimately prevailed.

"This shows what progress can be made when we focus on solving the problems Americans face every day. I hope Majority Leader Reid and our friends in the Senate will now choose to take similar action on House-passed solutions on other important issues, like giving working moms and dads more flexibility with their time, improving our job training system, and enacting long-needed reforms to "No Child Left Behind.'"

Rep. Roby, Alabama's only Member of Congress on the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, had supported a House bill that used a long-term, market-based approach to get Washington politics out of setting student loan interest rates. That bill, The Smarter Solutions for Students Act, passed the House in May. The Senate, however, languished over the issue for months, even after the July 1 deadline for the rate spike passed.

Last week, the Senate finally passed a student loan bill virtually identical to the House version. That bill, The Bipartisan Student Loan Certainty Act of 2013, was passed today in the House of Representatives by a vote of 392 to 31.

Additional bills from the House Committee Education and the Workforce awaiting Senate action include:

- The Working Families Flexibility Act, a bill Rep. Roby proposed that would help working Americans better balance the demands of work and family by removing unnecessary federal restrictions on comp time in the private sector;

- The SKILLS Act, a bill Rep. Roby co-sponsored which would improve the workforce development system by streamlining funding and ensuring training is available for in-demand jobs;

- The Student Success Act, which contains long-needed reforms to the nation's K-12 education law, known as "No Child Left Behind." The bill seeks to reduce the federal footprint in public schools and end the "one-size-fits-all" approach to education. Rep. Roby personally championed a provision of The Student Success Act that would stop the U.S. Department of Education from improperly coercing states into adopting certain policies using federal grants and regulation waivers.

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