FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, December 01, 2011
Media contact:
Zandra Rice Hawkins, (603) 892-2150
Speaker O'Brien Lies in Press Statement, Unable to Name a Single Business to Move to NH If HB 474 Had Passed
Granite State Progress Calls Bull on NH Speaker's Inaccurate Statement
CONCORD, NH – New statements today by NH Speaker Bill O'Brien and his leadership team confirm that the Speaker lied in a press statement issued to reporters yesterday afternoon.
Following the defeat of O'Brien's year-long attempt to pass anti-worker legislation HB 474 in New Hampshire, the Speaker's office issued a statement yesterday with the lie "Furthermore, the many companies who have expressed their interest in considering moving new jobs to New Hampshire if we are a Right-to-Work will not bring relief to the nearly 40,000 unemployed workers across the state."1
Granite State Progress shot back immediately with statements by both NH's Commissioner of Labor and NH's Commissioner of Resources and Economic Development that confirm not a single business has asked about the legislation: "Not once has the topic of right-to-work ever come up in all of [their] discussions with New Hampshire businesses and prospective businesses."2
Pushed by local media to name companies who have expressed this interest to the Speaker, O'Brien was unable to name even a single business that would consider moving new jobs to New Hampshire if the legislation was enacted. 3 Instead, the Speaker's office released a small list of 11 companies already based in New Hampshire who support the legislation – a list six times smaller than the one released by www.protectnhfamilies.org of local small businesses who vocally oppose the legislation.
"Speaker O'Brien needs to stop his lies," said Zandra Rice Hawkins, Director of Granite State Progress. "New Hampshire is a pro-worker state. The public supports it and there were enough middle class, working family legislators to stop this destructive legislation. The Speaker is grappling at straws by repeating lies he can't back up."
Granite State Progress publicly calls on Speaker O'Brien to release a list of the companies he purports are interested in moving jobs to the state with passage of the anti-worker legislation he has promised to bring back in 2012, against the will of the public and the House.
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Granite State Progress is a progressive advocacy organization that addresses issues of immediate state and local concern. Granite State Progress works as a communications hub for the progressive community to provide a strong, credible voice in advancing progressive solutions to critical community problems.
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1 NH House GOP, Republican leadership statement on Right to Work vote, 11.30.11, http://nhhousegop.com/category/press-releases
2 Union Leader, Businesses are not asking for the right-to-work bill by George Copadis, NH Commissioner of Labor, 5.24.11, http://www.unionleader.com/article/20110524/LOCALVOICES/705249993/0/NEWS0605
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