From VTDigger, Erin Mansfield reports that the Vermont Speaker of the House did not expect the independent contractor bill to pass this year. Erin writes:
Speaker Shap Smith, D-Morristown, said he doesn’t foresee H.867, whose vote on the House floor has been delayed several times, making it to Gov. Peter Shumlin’s desk this year.
Smith said the only political maneuvering that would keep the bill’s language alive would be to tack H.867’s provisions onto a bill that already passed the Senate, such as S.23, which relates to workers’ compensation settlements.
“I don’t think that there’s any way that it will go all the way to the governor’s desk,” he said. “I think that the work that we’re doing is important. If we can get it in a form that’s satisfactory, I think the work will be important for the next Legislature.”
The House Committee on Commerce and Economic Development, which voted the bill out unanimously, continues to take testimony on several amendments that would make the bill more satisfactory to pro-labor interests.
“It’s not clear to me whether we would or not” have the votes to pass the bill in its current form, Smith said. “What’s clear to me is in its current form, it wouldn’t go much beyond the floor of the House. In other words, I don’t think it would move in the Senate and make it to the governor’s desk.”
Read the full story at Smith gives independent contractor bill little chance this year
