Transcripts For CSPAN2 Key Capitol Hill Hearings 20140619

Now the testimony of gms Ceo Mary Barra and the attorney who conducted the investigation. The hearing is just under three hours. [inaudible conversations] i now convene this hearing titled the gm ignition switch recall investigation update. Ms. Barra when you were before the committee three months ago, you could not answer many of the questions about why to took gm years to figure out why the air bags were not deploying in your vehicles when they should have. It took years before issuing a safety recall. Now the report is public and it concludes it doesnt appear to be a case of coverup or conspira conspiracy. Instead the failure to recall the vehicles was a case of imco imcomptence and neglect. I still have questions about the whether the employees willingly withheld information that could have led to an earlier recall and prevented some of the tragedies that occurred. The facts surrounding the recall are far more concerning than a coverup. The employees giving the facts and who were tasked to figure out what went wrong didnt connect the dots because they were incomptent and different. I want to know how it happened and why it happened. Even when a good law like the tread act of 2000 is in this it requires people to use common sense and have a moral code. Here the key people at gm lacked all of this in a way we cannot underscore common sense and mandate morality or litigate com position. It has to be beyond paperwork and rules. The failures at gm remember accountability and culture. If they dont have the ability to do the right thing recognize things being wrong the answer is to change the people or the culture. That is a lesson under congressional scrutiny take note of and i hope officials in the Veterans Affairs are watching. The company appeared in no great hurry to figure out the problems disspite customer complaints and engineers they were able to turn off the ignition and finally reports of death. It wasnt until 2009 gm discovered there was any finding of the air bag to the power mode and then it took more years ling that to the ignition switch. That was raised in the lawsuit of a woman who died behind the wheel of a cobalt. How does this discovered . An investigator took two switches apart, something gm failed to do over seven years in the investigation of cobalt nondeployment of airbag. Mary barra you have publically acknowledged how troubleling have been. You have taken corrective action by changing procedures and trying to remove the road blocks to make sure safety concerns come to life. There are no easy fixes for the bro breakdowns that permitted engineers to look too a faulty issue. This concerns me and us all. We learned monday that the gm announced another recall. It is similar to the cobalt ignition switch. Buicks, chevy and cadillac ignition moves out of the run if the key has too much weight on it calling the vehicle to turn off and stall. It goes back to the vehicles from 2000. It doesnt tell us if gm made discovery during lawsuits that prevented the truth from coming out. I want to delve deeper into that and see if that occurred. A harder question for you ms. Barra to solve is why this happened. We know engineers approved a cost that didnt meet your concerns why . When complaints were raised about the cobalt ignition switch why wasnt it diagnosed as a safety problem . Is this something less specific but more difficult to address . A culture that doesnt accept responsibility or responsibility of problems. There was little to no evidence this troubled anyone. This is poor information sharing and silos and a failure to properly document change orders. We have known for year we had an airbag situation that is not working and why wasnt it asked what will be do about this. Thank you for being here. I will turn to the next speaker why are trying to undo the facts that led to the most tragic recall in the decade and that is the faulty ignition switches in the gm vehicles that we know have caused over a dozen deaths. These switches were bad from the start. They should have never been installed and once they were installed it became clear to gm officials that something was very, very wrong with them. Disturbingly the company left these unsafe vehicles on the road for over a decade. You have done important work describing how a defect known to gm employees for over a decade went unaddressed for very long. This describes engineering and investative failure, a lack of addressing issues, poor communication within the company and numerous other systemic problems. And it failed to inform customers and federal regulators of the problem. The report doesnt answer all of the key questions. It doesnt exchange how the ignition switch was approved without meeting specifications and then redesigned in 2006. It doesnt explain why stalling wasnt considered a safety issue. And as the chairplano eluded to the report doesnt show how this culture took root and persisted. The report singles out many individuals at gm who made poor decisions or failed to act, but it doesnt identify one individual in a position of high leadership who was responsible for the failures. The report has previous ceos, the legal depart and the gm board is left from knowing about the tragedy before. This is nothing to be proud of. That the most senior representatives didnt know about a problem that caused a dozen deaths. Ms. Barra you a mew ceo, but you have a decade long history with gm. You were executive Vice President of Global Development and the gm staff responsible for safety reported or through a chain of command to you. At least one high level executive who was working on solutions to the ignition switch problems reported directly to you. So while you may not have known about the defect many people that work are you did. The culture of the company is shaped by their Senior Leadership. They set the tone and attitudes of employees. They are also responsible for putting in place systems to foster transparency and those systems failed at gm. I want to know specific examples of how the culture can be changes to encourage reporting of problems not just structural management changes. I appreciate the changes you have made so far, ms. Barra, but i can i think the jury is still out on whether we can have success in the culture. And monday evening, just a couple days ago, another 3. 3 million cars with ignition switch and engine shutoff issues were recall including chevy impalas in production. Gm has announced 44 recalls this year alone affecting more than 20 million vehicles worldwide. This record reinforces the notions that the safety problemwise the cobalt and ion were not unique and the senior leaders, including you, should have responded to the cultureme culturement. We need to show the changes announced will address the longstanding issues at g. M. And in these last few minutes i want to acknowledge the families who are here in the hearing room today and their beloved loved ones with the pictures on the back wall. I know it isnt easy to learn about so many things with g. M. , you have my word that we will do our best to make sure this kind of tragedy will never, never happen again. And i know we can Work Together in a bipartisan way to do that. Recognize the chairman of the full committee mr. Upton. Thank you for returning to the committee ms. Barra as you said you would. Three months ago he held a hearing on this and asked a lot of tough questions but only got a few answers. I expect things different today. Our investigation tracks with the findings of the report that a maddening and deadly breakdown over a decade plagued by misopportunities and disconnects. Engineers didnt think about how the system linked together. They believe a car stalling while driving wasnt a safety concern. Despite having prove before their eyes an airbag system wasnt deploying when it should have. Employees avoided taking responsibility with the of the head. Ms. Barra, you have said you found the report deeply troubling as well. I find it very disturbing and downright devastating to you, to gm, to folks in michigan who live and breathe pride in the auto industry, but most of all to the families of the victims. The recall announced on monday this week makes it painfully clear that this is not just a cobalt problem. A new set of vehicles including multiple chevrolet, cadillac, buick models are facing an ignition switch recall for the very same kind of torque problem that lurked for over a decade in the cobalt and similar small vehicles with fatal consequences for unsuspecting drivers, including two teens from my own community. Ms. Barra, mr. Valukas, many questions today will focus on how and why this happened. I intend to focus on how we can make sure it never happens again. A culture that allowed safety problems to fester for years will be hard to change. But if gm is going to recover and regain the publics trust, it has to learn from this report and break the patterns that led to this unimaginable systemic breakdown. I want specifics on whether the changes youve already put in place really have made a difference. With the valukas report gm has provided an assessment of what went wrong. I want to be clear today that our information does continue. This committee has reviewed over 1 million pages of documents and interviewed key personnel from gm and ntsa. While were addressing gms actions in response today we will address ntsas part of the story in the near future. We dont yet have all the answers about what changes in our laws, the regulators practices or the companys culture would have prevented this safety defect from lingering so long or harming so many. But were going to find out. Yes, we will. The system failed and people died, and it could have been prevented. I yield the balance of my time to dr. Burgess. I thank the chairman of the full committee for yielding. We now know this is not an evidence problem. The evidence is simply overwhelming. Its an analysis problem. General motors still needs to answer the fundamental question of how it missed all of these glaring signs. Indeed, failure to recognize the problems in a timely fashion may well have cost 13 people their li thug this report isve this report is troubling and while everyone had responsibility to fix the problem, no one took responsibility. And that is not acceptable for one of americans Flagship Companies and one that millions of us relay on every day. According to the report, there are 90 recommendations to the problems and the failures that led to the ignition recall. I am certain all 90 are crucial but only one, accountability and accountability that is not transferrable is crucial. If person accountability is mussing as the report suggests, than dist disastrous consequences will occur and reoccur. This is the first step to solving the problem identifying it. I hope also there are some answers for many of us as to effect and understanding of the problem and will this effect the cases that have been litigated and how does g. M. s bankruptcy affect the position on the cases that were previously litigated and perhaps we can touch on mr. Feinbergs employee. He is an employee of g. M. Or working for the crash victims. All of these questions need to be answered and i look forward to your testimony and thong. I thank you mr. Chairman for holding this hearing. The second on the failure to recall g. M. Vehicles Nathaniel Philbrick in a timely manner. The families of the victims of g. M. s defective vehicles deserve better. G. M. Failed you. And we are looking at the pictures in the back of the room and they need more than an apology. On june 5th, a review of g. M. s ignition switch failures and his report was released on june 5th. The report characterized g. M. As a company with a con voluted structure and a place where there was an institutional failure it work with different departments. There is a story about a whistle blower to tried to bring the attention to the company and lost his job as a result. During the previous appearance before the submity ms. Barra pointed to the report and addressing the many questions she wasnt able to answer and i look forward to getting answers to the questions today. A question i raised at my last hearing has yet to be answered and that is how g. M. Is going to c compensate injured or those who lost loved ones. Ms. Barra said it would take her and ken who was designed on how to establish a victims fund up to 3060 days to determine how to proceed with the claims. It has been 79 days so i hope we will get the answers today. When the report became public quote we failed these customers and must face up and learn from it. 15 g. M. Employees have been dismissed but it isnt clear that any senior level manager has been held responsible for the g. M. Corporate culture that allowed the ignition switch defect to go unaddressed for years after being first discovered in 2001. The question is how far does this extend to g. M. . Purchasing supply from 2011 until taking over as ceo ms. Barra was, from may understanding, responsible for safety issues. He was unaware that serious questions should have been asked about the defect. Two newspapers addressed the defect in 2005. If i were a senior level executive that read about that in the newspaper i would want action. The report make ss suggestions change the corporate climate to respond faster and better and that improves including communication with the Traffic Safety administration and i look forward to hearing from ms. Barra about the changes the company has already made and its plans for future improvements. That is not enough a deterant with a company over 150 billion in revenue. Sounds like a slap on the wrist. I am an cosponsor of hr 4064 which increases the penalties of informing the public of the defects. I am working on legislation that would do the same while also addressing several other issues raise by the defect including requiring the Public Disclosure of technical bulletins and they provide information to dealerships about how to experience a wide spread problem. In g. M. s case, tcb were issued for the faulty switch. In 2005, ten years before a recall, they were instructed to replace the part. I hope todays hearing will allow us to consider additional action that might be needed for recalls. I look forward to hearing from the witnesses and i yield back. Thank you. I would now like to introduce the witnesses on the panel for todays hearing. Mary barra is chief executive officer for General Motors i would like to introduce mary barra who has been with the company 30 years and held a number of positions within the company crowing Vice President of global manufacture and engineering from 20082009 and executive direct of vehicle manufacture from 20052008. We have a lit gator here and a former u. S. Attorney and a fellow of American College lawyers. He is the author of the report on the findings that were released two weeks ago. I will now swear in the witnesses. You are aware the committee is holding an investigative hearing and has the practices of taking testimony under oath. Do you have any objection inboth witnesses say they dont. Under the rules of the house and committee you are entitled to be advised by counsel do you either advise . Both decline. Thank you. In that case if you would raise your right hand, i will swear you in. Do you swear the testimony you are about to give is the truth and whole truth and nothing but the truth . Thank you. Both answered in the afirmm afirmmitive. Ms. Barra please pull the mike close and turn it on as well. Thank you. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I appreciate the chance to appear before you again today on the ignition switch issue. Before i proceed with my brief remarks i want to again express my sympathy to the families that lost loved ones and those who suffered physical injury. I am mind full we have a special responsibility to them and those families and the best way to fufill that responsibility is to fix the problem by putting in place the needed changes to prevent this from ever happening again. When i was here 11 weeks ago, i told you how we intended to proceed with this matter. I promised we would conduct a transparent investigation into the causes of the ignition switch problem. I promised we would hold people accountable and make changes in the approach to recall. And i promised we would develop a program to comensate those who lost loved ones and suffered injuries. We have done this and more. The report as you know is thorough, brutally tough, and deeply troubling. It paints a picture of a company that failed to handle the situation in the right way. This is enormiously painful for those who dedicated their live to the company. There is no way to minimize the seriousness of what was discovered. On june 2nd they were presented to the board of directors of g. M. I will leave it to him to comment on the report but i want you to know my reaction to the report and some of the actions i have taken since reviewing it. First, we have made a number of personal decisions. 15 individuals identified in the report are no longer with the company. We have restructured our safety Decision Making process to raise it to the highest levels of the Company Addressing a key point in the report that critical information was kept from management. Under the new system this shouldnt happen again. We are conducting what i believe is the most exhaustive safety review in the history of our company. We are leaving no stone unturned and devoting whatever resources it takes to identify potential safety issues in our Current Issues and on vehicles no longer in production. Our responsibility is to set a new norm and a new Industry Standard on safety and quality. I have told our employees it is not enough to fix the problem. We need create a new standard and we will create a new norm. We have announced the creation of Integrity Organization that is enhancing the safety of our product and we are taking an aggressive approach on recall and bringing greater rigor and discipline to our analysis and Decision Making process regarding the recalls and other safety related matters. It is difficult to announce so many recalls but it is the right thing to do. As we discuss last time we have engaged kenneth for the Compensation Program and the process is moving rapidly. He has indicated he is going to share the criteria this month and we expect to process claims by august 1st. We created the Vehicle Safety position and appointed a specialist in the field for this position. We are named a senior attorney to support that position and facilitate rapid information sharing across the organization. We added 35 safety investigators that are allowing us to identify and address safety issues more quickly. And we instituted a speak up for Safety Program encouraging employees to recognize quickly and recognizing them we do so. This is the start of changing the way we think and act at General Motors. Two weeks ago, i addressed the entire Global Workforce about issues and i told the team these actions were not excusable and while i want to solve the problems as quickly as possible i never want anyone associated with gm to forget what happened. I want this etched in our memories. This is a tragic problem that should not never have happened and cannot happen again. The report make ss recommendatis in eight areas and many we started before and are already impleme implemented. I know you are wondering about my commitment to solve deep problems that were uncovered in the report. The answer is simple. I will not rest until these problems are resolved. As i told employees i am not afraid of the truth and i will not accept business as usual. It is time and past time to assist on total accountability and make sure Vital Information is shared across the company so we can unleash the full power of 200,000 employees, 21,000 dealers and 23,000 suppliers. We are a good company but we can and must be much, much better. This is my focus and this is my promise to you, our employees, our customers, Share Holders and the American People. Thank you again for having me here today. I am pleased to take your questions. My explicit man date from the General Motors board of directors was to promote and provide a report as to how and why this occurred. To pursue the facts wherever they took us and report them in a report. General motors board also directed me to make recommendations based on the facts and finding to help them ensure this didnt happen again. My firm was given unfettered acaccess to the g. M. Witnesses and documents. We interviewed 230 witnesses some multiple times and we had about 350 interviews some lasting 68 hours. 41 million documents were reviewed coming from the top executives down to the individuals involved at the technical level. That number of documents involved tens of millions of items reviewed personal. And this was in an effort to find out the fact why cobalt recall took a decade and why that switch was unaccounted for during that period of time. I provided a copy of that report was provided to the committee. I am not going through the detail but the story of the cobalt is a story of individual and organizational failures that led to devastating consequences. Throughout the decade, it took General Motors to recall the cobalt, as described, there was lack of accountability, urgency, and failure of the Company Personal charged with safety issues to understand how the far was manufacture and the interplay between the switch and the automobile. We review the failures and identify cultural issues that may have contributed to this problem. General motors requested we provide recommendations this problem doesnt take place in the future. That is an issue which g. M. Must deal. The report doesnt give all of the answers. Thank you. I recognize myself for five minutes of questions now. Isravaluka valukas, do you agree with the comment that culture is the problem and they failed to recognize significant issues . I agree there is specific people involved that didnt act appropriate. You have been with the company 30 years . I have. How does someone spending the entire culture of g. M. Change the culture . You mentioned 15 were fired and that 99. 9 percent of the same people. If you havent changed the people how do you change the culture . The 15 people no longer with the country didnt take action they should or didnt work urgently enough to fix the situati situation. What is more important is we create an environment where engineer and everyone is able to come to work and do their best work, be supported, and that is the cultural we are working to create with speak up for safety and the structural changes. The Previous Article by bloomberg notes the predecessor of the cobalt raised questions about a defective fuel line and had to continue to do that and move forward with whistle blower actions. This was on page 93 of the record where it says he was reluctant to pursue safety issues because his president preside predecessor was pushed out for that. You concluded there was no conspiracy. Does annum an employee who acts alone or doesnt show information is that a coverup . If he understand it is a safety issue and decides to con seal that that is a coverup, yes, it is. And where life saving information is in boxes with dust. Is that a coverup . What we found in connection was the following. We found that a large number of individuals had information in the first instance didnt believe it was safety. They looked at it like a convenience matter. We didnt find evidence any individual had information with a recall. You put in the report that mr. Oakly says he is reluctant to push on safety issues. On page 93 he was reluctant to push on the safety issues because of the predecessor being pushed from a job. That implies he withheld information. Is he still working . Yes, and he raised issues with the speak up program. It sounds like he decided not to speak up he is now and we are taking it seriously. I find it hard to believe of 210,000 employees not a single one in the company had the integrity to say i think we are making a mistake. That is puzzling to me. Even out of the va hospital we have lots of whistle blowers. I dont see in g. M. There is whistle blowers. Not a Single Person you interviewed in this . Let me jump to another question. I want to get back to this. There was a lot of issues about lawsuits. I dont see questions if you exami exami examined if g. M. Responded to victim discovery. Did you find, i dont know if you talked to plaintiffs attorney in the case, but did you find the information in the cases were responded to in a timely manner and the information presented to g. M. Was timely . At the very beginning of this investigation, i sent letters and emails to plaintiffs lawyers who were involved in the most sensitive cases. So we could talk in the investigation and determine they canned deal with that issues. Not one of the attorneys responded to me. I interviewed the attorneys outside connection with the g. M. Matters to determine whether i had any evidence there of something that would indicate they had facts they were withholding and i didnt find evidence with that. I reviewed all of the emails with connection to all of the cases. I say i general it determine if there was evidence there was information they were making to settle a case because they wanted to conceal the safety defect and recall. I am out of time but i want to say there is a difference between not getting a response and not having the facts. When you task mr. Valukas with the information if you dont have the information do you still want it . The information with regard to if information wasnt passed on, the plaintiffs attorney boo whoa who made the request. I am out of time. Thank you, chairman. Mr. Valukas, you talked about this g. M. Nod and absolute on page 255266 where one witness described the g. M. Phenomenon as aprovided the responsibility and crossing the arms and pointing toward others indicating the responsibility belongs to someone else not me. And then you said mary barra describes the phenomenon of the g. M. Nod where everyone agrees with proposed action but leaves the room with no intention to follow through. When the chairman asked mary barra about this she said quote there were specific people involved that didnt act appropriate. Do you think this was just limited to the 15 people who have been terminated from g. M. . Yes or no i cannot answer that question. You think it was only 15 people who did the g. M. Nod and salute . No, i think a number of people thank you. And although you learned the problems with the ignition safety issues were known by little the ceo was unaware for years. Is that correct . Yes. Gms ceos and gms General Council and ms. Barra correct . That is correct. And ms. Barra you testified you didnt know about the problems with the ignition switch until december 2013. I testified i knew there was an issue with the cobalt issue. In december 2013 . January of 2014 is when i about the ignition issues. And the decision made in 2004 about the stalling being a safety risk. Were those shared with you yes or no . No. And a Senior Executive brought in to find solutions to the airbag sichation in 2012, he knew about the problems and reported directly to you. Did he share the knowledge . He reported directly for a time did he ever tell you about the problems . No. You have made a lot of changes but the Company Culture is what concerns me as well as the chairman. And the problems i have identified today are not problems about who reports to him but a culture that encourages people not to stick out their neck and report things. And in fact just yesterday i learned from a source very close to g. M. Who has knowledge of the culture there that the results of mr. Valukas investigations and the termination of the employees has only created more paranoia people are going to lose their jobs. So what are you doing not just to change the structure but the culture at the company so the company rewards people reporting problems not sweeping it under the rug . To your point it isnt done by words, slogans or action. What is it you are doing . The speak up for Safety Program and i am getting information from employees i am acting on it. We have a regular program we will be recognizing those individuals. I have spoken to employees globally and encouraging them. But the work we are doing and the actions we are doing demonstrate how sincere we are to put the customer at the center of everything we do. We want to make sure we are doing the right thing as it relates to safety and quality. I would like you supplement your answer with the ways you are are doing this. I want to talk about Compensation Fund. We dont have many details of it. Has the company determined the criteria about who is eligible, yes or no . He has a draft would you provide that to the committee. The draft protcol. Let me ask you this. Will there be discretion to make eligible for payment victims beyond those identified by g. M. To date . We are hearing there maybe up to a hundred deaths from this. We want to capture every Single Person who suffered physical injury or lost a loved one. So your answer is yes . Yes. And will those people who receive payments from this program be required to release their legal claims . Im sorry . The israelentary voluntary no will they have to release their claim . I cannot state specifically. I recognize mr. Upton for for five minutes. I am a Firm Believer you cannot solve a problem you dont understand. I want to walk through the key problems we identified. First a simple yes or no, is the true that g. M. Engineers didnt believe the ignition switch moving from run to accessory was a safety problem . Ms. Barra first. Yes. And mr. Valukas . Yes. Can you con firm a cobalt experienced a shut off after hitting the key with his knee and it was categorized as an annoyance rather than safety issue. Yes. Lets talk about how warnings and experiences were handled. I read with a lot of concern alleging that employee safety concerns went unheaded. I want to get your reaction to a case uncovered about a specific employee concern. I want to know how it was handled at the time and how it was handled if raised today. You have a tab on page 83 in your binder. But in 05 a g. M. Employee drove an 06 impala home and after hitting a bump the ignition switch fell out of run and stalled the car. Let me read you the email after taking it repair. Quote i think this is a serious safety problem especially if the switch is on multiple programs. I am thinking big recall. I was driving 45 Miles Per Hour when i hit the pot hole and the car shut off and i had a car driving behind me swerving. I dont like to imagine a customer driving with their kids in the back on i75 and hitting a pothole in rush hour traffic. I think you should considered changing this part to a switch with a stronger detent. Nine years ago, a g. M. Suggested the stalling of a 06 impala was a problem and talked about the recall. When was the recall for the impala announced . I believe it was part of monday. Two years ago. Nine years ago. So, looking at that case and as if it happened today, can you tell us how a concern like this would be handled if it was raised today . As i testified when i was here we considered a stall to be a safety issue. When a stall is brought forward, if we learn and understand it is because of a defect in the vehicle, we are going to address it. Stalls happen with you run out of gas or pop the clutch as well. But if we are aware of the stall and learn it is because some part of the vehicle or a system isnt operating properly we will take action and that is what represented on monday. Mr. Valukas, in going through the report there were some comments made as to the consumer friendliness of the tread acts in terms of complaints and what suggestions might you have relating to that . In terms of proceeding in the futu future . I dont have a specific legislation suggestion for you. I included in the recommendation something i think that is important for g. M. They need to look at them as a partner so the transmission of information is a free flow and problems are elevated at the earliest possible point. From the earlier aspects of the investigation, there were times it was an advisary relationship. Do you have a comment ms. Barra as it relates to the com piling of the information . I think it is important we have a productive relationship with the agency and i do think there is things that can be done from a National Database and improving the search capability to use valuable information in the tread database. I have a clarifying question. Given that, i think, g. M. Recalled Something Like 40 million cars, do you have a revi revised number on the crashes that might have been associated with the recall . We know of no fatalities overall with the recall on monday. With the information that we have as it relates to the cobalt and the population of these vehicles the known number we have is 13. Recognize mr. Dingle now. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Welcome to ms. Barra and to mr. Valukas. We appreciate you being here today. You mr. Valukas and your team have compiled a report about internal shortcomings at g. M. That contributed to the companys failure to report a safety defect in the chevy cobalt. I know that ms. Barra shares by grave concern about the report finding and i look to her and the g. M. Leadership tr establishes more responsible cultures at g. M. We all recognize your report as not an end to the investigation. It does include a number of common sense recommendations which i feel g. M. Should commit to implementing in full. My questions today will require simple yes or no answers. Now, to ms. Barra, we are learned that cobalts ignition switch was redesigned but wasnt given a new part number. This contributed to a delay in defect reporting and srecalls. Mr. Valukas suggested that g. M. Adopt procedures that include specific protocol for reviewing authorizations of out of specifications parts. Tracking unspecification parts, identifying who should be notified of them and identifying and elevating any particular safety issues at might be associated with the use of out of specification parts. The report goes on to suggest that high level review should be required before approval of use of out of specification parts. Now, does g. M. Commit to impleme implementing these particular suggestions in full, yes or no . Yes. Now ms. Barra, mr. Valukas suggests in his report that g. M. Make improvements earnest in its problem tracking resolution he suggested the standard for closing erts without action is clearly defined and sufficiently rigorous. He goes on to suggest that prts shouldnt be closed without action. Absent clear sign off by individuals and appropriate levels of review. Further more, his report suggested that g. M. Reaffirm the lack of acceptable Business Case isnt an acceptable reason for closing out a prts. If that involves a safety issues, does g. M. Commit to implementing these suggesting moving forward . Yes or no. Yes. Now, again, ms. Barra, likewise, i think we all agree with mr. Valukas that g. M. Should implement more robust policies in training with respect to component and Vehicle Safety matters. At the most basic level does g. M. Commit to trading its employees its about the lessons learns from the cobalt investigation . Yes or no . Yes. And again, ms. Barra, will g. M. Trade employees train to recognize and elevate safety issues including the emphasis on the need to identify and address safety issues active regardless of whether the vehicle are in the design or Production Phase . Yes or no. Yes. When fostering a culture of safety it is important we recognize employees who recognize and report safety problems in components and vehicles feel comfortable in so doing. As such does g. M. Commit to promote visibility and enforce rigilously the nonretaliation policy contained in paragraph 19 of the may 16th, consent order. Yes or no . Yes. And now ms. Barra, it is important that all auto makers communicate clearly and promptly, will g. M. Create a centralized database for all communications with nhtsa and train employees who communicate with nhtsa to file in this database . Yes or no . Yes. Do you think that is good for other companies . You think that that is good for other companies . Yes, i do. Gentlemans time has expired. Mr. Chairman, i thank you for your courtesy. Thank you very much. Now recognize the vice chair of the full committee. Miss barra, thank you for coming back. Ive got a few questions for you, and i have to tell you many of my questions that i asked and couldnt get answers for in april when you were with us, you said after mr. Valukas finished the report, you hoped to be able to answer these questions. Now, since that time, i have been able to be on the floor at the spring hill facility which is near my district. Weve got 1,868 employees that certainly do not want the gm brand to be tarnishedl and so its important to me on behalf of all those constituents that we get some answers and that we do this and very quickly so we thank you for coming back to us today. I want to go back to something i asked you about in april and you explained it doesnt made all specifications can still be acceptable for safety and the example that you used was with still steel. We know that the cobalt ignition switch was redesigned in 06, right . And testing documents from that time showed that the torque of their redesigned switch was still below specifications and yet after this change they reported incidents of the nondeployment these vehicles dropped dramatically. But when they look at that and we read those documents and the chairman mentioned we have been through a million pages of documents and 15,000 pages of documents from nhtsa so we are not sitting idly on this. We are taking action so i want you to go back through this and elaborate that something could still not meet specifications and be acceptable for safety and i would like to hear from you when it is okay to deviate from specifications and people in the process not be aware of this . I think when you look as you start developing something you have a design specification that what is most important in the td have done in the past but are doing in a much more broad fashion now relates to the actual performance of the parts and how the part operates in a subsistence how it operates in a broad system and how it operates in the vehicles so as we designed now we are validating at the part level within an organization we put together called the product Integrity Organization. They are actually now looking at doing much more validation as it pertains to subsistence. All the parts come together that it operates as a system and perform safely. That is within organization has accomplished. Okay so what youre saying then, if it doesnt affect the safety or its okay not to meet specifications . Im saying it has to meet performance requirements. Okay then how shouldnt engineer evaluating the performance the parts performance against the Technical Specifications . Again you look at performance against requirements. One of the requirements of how that part needs to behave in the system and that is how an engineer evaluating but again what we are doing now is taking that much more broadly so we are not relying on one person across the whole vehicle. In this product integrity system how does gm track the deviations that are occurring from the Technical Specifications . Thats all captured in very specific documents. How transparent is it . Is a transparent to the engineer . Is available to the chief engineers and the organization. Was this done when the switch was approved in 02 and redesigned in 06 . What im talking about is what we have done this year. So this was not done so we still have there was a glitch in the system and people approve the part that was not okay . The problem with a specific change you are referring to us the change was made in it was not documented. Then how does the gm engineer know when there is a deviation from a specification if it is too much or too little or if it is acceptable or if it is going to pose a safety problem . See again there is a couple aspects of this that you have to look at but if you go back to when those changes were made and it was not documented the records were not there to documents that there was a change amount of something that is unacceptable and the individual that the document that is no longer with the company. Make sure the part to subsistence the system meets those requirements and have full documentation. See all right i will yield back. The gentle lady yields back and i now recognize mr. Braley for five minutes. Thank you mr. Chairman. Ms. Barra welcome back. I want to start with some of the comments he made in your opening remarks and they have a couple of questions i want to talk to you about. You mention specifically that you promised he would conduct a comprehensive and transparent investigation. You believe that those accomplished . I think the valukas report was comprehensive. It was very farreaching and we have shared that information. You also said that you promised he would share the findings of the report with congress are regulators nhtsa and the courts. This is a copy of the report that we received and it states on the very front page of the report privileged and confidential protected by attorneyclient privilege and as a attorney work product. You indicated that you hired mr. Valukas to do this independent investigation but its obvious from the report that you consider this to be an attorneyclient relationship in the report itself has sections blocked out so that we on this panel dont know who some of the victims were better identified in the report. Were you aware of that. Yes. You also indicated that you engaged mr. Feinberg to develop a just and timely program for compensating the families who lost loved ones and those who had suffered serious physical injury including the families who are represented here today. There was a recent news report from the detroit news which indicated that mr. Feinberg has confirmed that the Compensation Fund will not in any way address people who were not killed, people who werent seriously injured and will not in any way address people who werent killed, people who werent seriously injured whose value of the automobiles they purchased has been diminished because of all the controversy over these parts that we have been talking about. Were you aware of back . The Compensation Program that mr. Feinberg will independently administered are the value of the vehicle is in front of the courts. See will that be addressed by mr. Feinberg craig c. Thats correct. One of the things we know theres your loan gm has issued an astonishing 44 recalls covering 17. 7 million vehicles in the u. S. And more than 20 million worldwide. How many of those recalls to your knowledge relate to problems that were known to someone at gm before the bankruptcy sale order of july 2009 . See at the senior level no action would have been taken. So adjure testimony that none of those are covert . I am not sure. You were saying here today that no one, that none of the recalls that have been initiated this you relate to problems known to someone at gm before the bankruptcy sale order in july 2009 . See what i said the Senior Leadership had no knowledge of those issues. Thats my question. You did a very exhaustive investigation into the cultural problems at gm. My question as part of that investigation did you identify anyone working at gm who acknowledged relating to those product recalls that covered products affected by that bankruptcy discharge order in july of 2009 . See if there was a known safety issue there would have been a recall then. Did you attempt to determine that . I was not involved in that process so i cannot comment. Is not possible that discharge order contributed to gms blacks approach to safety defects on cars built by the old gm . Absolutely not. We have talked about this closer to responsibility with gm. You have testified about it. Its covered in mr. Valukas singhs report. How can you say absolutely not when you have not even focused on that issue . Map the evidence of that as there were many recalls that were conducted during a period of time but i would say now we have redoubled their efforts and come back more exhaustively in looking at data from Customer Feedback and its already accomplishing a higher level to ensure we have the safest vehicles. Mr. For lucas the screwdriver that was handed out by General Motors in the 70s and 80s as a promotional item and assess safety comes first and gm on the screwdriver. As part of your investigation did you look back as to whether the old gm had made safety a priority at the same way that ms. Barro says the new gm is committed to it here today and arent their institutional problems that are much farreaching, much more farreaching than simply firing 15 employees . Congressman a good question. We looked back and solicited from everyone we attribute information about whether something in the culture caused something differently than they otherwise would have done our safety became a secondary issue. Almost uniformly people would say to a safety with a top priority that we identified in this report all of the instances of which we were aware related to this matter where people took a different position. I would not ascribe to everybody the conduct of the people involved here but i do say culture its something to do with the reasons why this recall took this recall takes a long. My time is up. Thank you for your testimony. See we now recognize the gentleman from texas for five minutes. Thank you mr. Chairman. Ms. Bear we are glad to have you back in mr. Valukas we are glad to have a before us. Our opportunity or responsibility on the committee is to provide for the general welfare to get the facts on the table so that people can have faith that the products that your company produces are safe and of course your requirement is to make sure that you do produce a safe product that hopefully result in a profit for the company and the stockholder but we are both on the same side. We both want products that are safe and let the public be aware of the capabilities but also the shortfalls. Im going to ask most of my questions to mr. Valukas simply because we did not have your port at this time but i will have one or two questions for ms. Barra at the end of my time. I want to focus on the fact that the part number was not changed back in april of 2006. A gm engineer did approve changes to the ignition switch but did not change the part number and mr. Valukas in your report, you observed that the decision to not change the part number was not properly vetted or scrutinized. You note that a mr. Degiorgio did not recall why he did not change the part number. Is that correct . Is that what youre report says . Mr. Degiorgio told us he did not change the part number and that is a looked back at it and he reflected that he shouldve changed the part number. Apparently and obviously thats very important because you have a part number changed and that creates a paper trail with some sort of problem that have to be corrected and if you are doing investigation you can compare and from that time forward see if the problem was fixed. I want to direct your attention to the big binder that we have got right between you and ms. Barra and on tab 35. 35 . Yes sir 35 there is an april 5 chain of emails between mr. Degiorgio and engineers at the switch supplier delphi and other gm employees. Attached to that exchange is a spreadsheet making changes to the adult ignition switch. Can you locate that . See i think i have that, yes. Its interesting to me that these emails the subject is not anything that is safety related. These subject matter is increased process capability and then it goes in the email it talks about this as a black box design and they want to change the part to increase the process capability. This will improve the fallout rate at the delphi condor of plant. First of all, what is a fallout great . I persimmons the rate at which something sales. Okay so if you increase the fallout rate that means you are going to decrease the number of failures. Is it important in your mind that since they talk about a black box, apparently anything within the black box they dont have to be too worried about and as long as everything in the black box works as specified. Because apparently in retrospect theres quite a bit of commentary about we didnt pay much attention because it was all within a black box. Thats a commentary that when there is the rules have changed the format function whether to black box or otherwise in a situation particular to this aspect of that which is decreasing the torque, that would fall within one of those three categories and i think you can find defined box that mr. Degiorgio conceded this was a change in the function and would have required a change in the part and the consequences were devastating over the years. This is not the only time that issue came up four times as you properly note where people came back to him and said did something change and he said no and thats one of the reasons why this took a decade. Do you think that this particular email exchange that they knew they had a safety problem and they are coaching their phraseology differently to hide it because they dont really talk about a torque issue or anything. They are talking about fallout rate within the black box. Do you think this was intentional . No, i dont. But they put it this way. We have not been given access to delphi witnesses. We have been not been permitted to interview them and i received documents have been limited for them. In the gm side dance to that question is no. Ms. Barra in the time that i dont have anymore my question to you ms. Blackburn try to elucidate an answer from you about the change in culture and the fact that even when making specification changes that they didnt meet the specification wasnt that a problem and should we make sure the specification send your answer was that the overall system works its okay. To me that doesnt represent a cultural change and i have talked to the General Motors engineers and Management Team in my district in arlington and they are vocally insistent that they are not going to use any part in your plan that doesnt meet specifications and operate just as it is supposed to see i totally agree with you. Apart needs to operate justice is supposed to. First of all everything that is done is documented, its gone for a validation process and also gone through Systems Integration so its much more rigorous and knowing that the part is good in the system or the vehicle is going to perform safely and with quality. And as it relates to making apart changed absolutely acceptable. I totally agree with the people you talk to at the arlington plant. If you do not have the document of part number you shouldnt be changing parts so the answer is absolutely correct and i appreciate the fact that they are committed to doing that. See the gentlemans time has expired. I now recognize mr. Butterfield for five minutes. Thank you mr. Chairman. Its a an unspeakable tragedy that so many families have suffered as a result of the shortcomings that General Motors and some of these families are with us today. It is stable as it may be a simpler want to offer my condolences to the families who have been affected. Let me start with you ms. Barra. Its a barra or barra . Its barra. Ms. Barra mr. Lavoie is on the Public Record stating the company has hired 40 new defect investigators. How many of these individuals will be new to the company . I cant speak specifically that i can tell you that i believe most of them them came within a company that they came and i know how the Selection Process was. They were some of our very best engineers across the company so they knew brought together collectively a broad array of parts and systems in the vehicle. I interacted with your company and suggest that all 40 of these individuals would be promoted from within the company. Do you dispute that . As i said i can tell youve wanted to came from outside. We did an exhaustive search inside to get some of the best and most experienced engineers into this role. I think youve heard the theme throughout the committee on both sides of the aisle that we are talking about a new culture and i would strongly suggest you look at bringing in some outside fresh blood to that part of the company. How many vehicles has General Motors recalls as the cobalt recall began in february . I have heard 40 million but i know thats over period of years but how many actually have been recalled since february of this year . I would have to add up account. I dont know if he has that information. If several million to the tens of millions. Let me ask you this. How were Vehicle Owners in by jim about these recalls clinics do you email them, do you mail them . The call them and then thats a process that we send a letter that we have gone above and beyond that. We have sent additional letters in addition to the ones required as part of the nhtsa process. We have also gotten on social media and also hired more than 100 people to work on a customary Engagement Center to call and reach out to these individuals. We also know dealers have been great partners in this and have in many cases gone having contacted or receive calls that explained the situation. So you go beyond the address of record. Absolutely. Thats reassuring. When you communicate with Vehicle Owners arent they informed of the seriousness of these safety hazards imposed by the ignition switch . Very specifically in a letter to states to operate the vehicle safely in eight to have a key purchase the key and the ring and take everything off your key ring. We have also told these individuals that they are still uncomfortable although we have demonstrated nsn has reviews it and said its safe to operate the vehicles this way with the key with a ring that the individual still is uncomfortable because we are customer focused we are putting these individuals into loughner or rental vehicles. What percentage of people who were notified bring the cars back into the dealer . Cen general we are in the 80s and i have been told we are one of the highest in how we complete recalls but in this case we are still working through it. It. Once theyre how long does it take to get it fixed . Its a matter of an hour. A couple of hours and you can get it done. It seems like theres a large volume of recalls according to her testimony and im more concerned about how safely and timely can these corrections being made . Well. The large volume you talk about millions of cars. In some cases replacing apart in some cases its as simple as making sure connection was made. In other cases for instance in some of our crossover vehicles over time a cramp of an election electrical wire is a matter for recramping and soldering back. I know it sounds like a large number of vehicles and it is that we want to do the right thing for customers. To my knowledge this is the most expansive comprehensive review we have done. In some cases theres no tread data to support theres an issue but as we went in and looked the subsystems performance we wanted to make sure. One dealer one large dealer can do dozens. We have dealers that are extending their hours and Service Department to be responsive to customers to get these repairs made. Is jammed currently looking at other product lines which have not been recalled today . We will continue as i said we can plan to be substantially complete with the end of the month with an additional people put in that we will continue until we are confident whether to different Safety System or ignition switch that we. We now recognize dr. Burgess. Thank you mr. Chairman and ms. Barra if we could continue on that line of questioning that mr. Butterfield was pursuing. How were your dealers holding up under what must be a massive onslaught of people getting their cars fixed . Our dealers are doing a tremendous job of supporting the customer. As i. As i said we have many dealers who are reaching out. We have had dealers who have had a customer that was several miles away. For instance there was one who were concerned because their daughter had the vehicle and there was a dealership closed by. The dealer went back and forth and got the vehicle vehicle got their pyramid and gave them alone or so i cant be more proud of howard dealers are supporting the customer. But again you have millions of cars that need to get in and be attended to. Is it pretty hard to provide a loaner car for that population . First of almost dealers for a simple repair have loaner programs. It depends on the dealer and issue but specifically the cobalt and that population of vehicles where providing rentals are loners and we have worked with rental companies to make sure they have enough vehicles to do that but again in many of these cases even though the vehicles are recalled its a simple visual inspection to note the vehicle is okay or not in the dealers are very quick to do that with their service technicians. I recall being on this committee when we went through this with toyota in 2009 the toyota dealership in the district i represent have extended hours but stayed open until late at night to accommodate people who otherwise were working and could not get in. Do you feel that is the case currently with the gm dealers . I absolutely do. Ive spoken to hundreds of dealers and they know our north american president allen davy we have regular comedic you should. See what seems to be the choke point . Is it getting apart to the dealer . We have produced and shipped over 400,000 parts. The challenge is getting the customer to come in and get the vehicle repaired and that is why we have employed a lot of innovative ways to do that and the dealers are reaching out. The story in the New York Times people talk about receiving multiple coat postcards and you have to come get your car fixed and they say ive tried that they dont have a car available for me. We start another line within a week so we are continuing to ramp up of right now we do have the parts. We try to remain fair and a firstcome firstserved basis. They are required in the frequency by law and we are complying with the love. Thank you. Mr. Valukas let me ask you a couple of questions. I heard from your introduction that you are trial attorney. Is that correct . I will tell you at some point were you just pulling your hair out over some of these things in your investigation going through this information . See you have the binder in front of me but page 119, 118 and 119. Heres a paragraph. Witnesses have inconsistent recollection as to whether the product investigation became in the cobalt airbag nondeployment issues at this stage. The abridged report said april 7 the cobalt airbag letter to the ti group or was taken on by an engineer. Documents indicate he was working on the issue in the may 4, 2007 status review presentation worksheets states he was scheduled to present on an issue described as cobalt airbag discussion item. They had no recollection of the involvement. They were right up to the point where they had an answer and now this guy does name remember working on it. Was that frustrating from a trial lawyers perspective . One of the key problems we found is the fact that the of documentation which led to a of accountability. A classic example of that is what happened in 2005 when they went back to find out why did they close the investigation to cobalt issue and we found ourselves in a position where there were no notes with regard to the matter. Everybody at the Meeting Point to somebody else in the meeting as having responsibility for having close the matter that but we could not ascertain who have their responsibility but what were the circumstances which caused the closure to take place . That of accountability is reflected in so many of these areas. We they went back and we were dealing not. I might run out of time. The 15 individuals have been terminated by General Motors is that correct . We cant know those as we read the report we cant know the names of those 15 individuals because of employee privacy concerns. Is that correct . [inaudible] for the committee . To respect her privacy. Thank you for that. What was the basis for termination because when i go through this it looks like more than 15 people shouldve been terminated. There was a senior group of my leaders that we look at and read the report and we are very thorough and looking at those who have believed it and take the actions they should and those who simply didnt move with a sense of urgency. The people closest to us over repeated period of time are those that are no longer with the company. Thank you. I now recognize mr. Green for five minutes. Thank you mr. Chairman for the followup hearing. Ms. Barra you said you checked 400,000 parts. Is that for the ignition . How many were recalled . I keep hearing 16 million. Of the specific emissions which cylinder because its a kid we put together the total number of vehicles produced locally with over 2. 6 million we know not all of those are in Service Today and we have built kids to the 2. 6 population of reported thousands will be complete by august october 4. You have been vocal about gms effort to change its Corporate Culture which you describe as the cost culture. Mr. Valukas can you describe some of the problems he saw what the Corporate Culture in your report and talk about the gm not in the gm salute . What were these reforms . Let me be specific on that. Gm, without using those phrases, you have a situation where it took a plaintiffs lawyer to do this simple thing of comparing two switches one from 2006 and one from 2090 find out that gm and many are two separate switches. No one goes back to revisit previously made decisions so if the decision we have made we dont go back and revisit it to see if theres something else. We have a situation where we have had people within gm that had certain levels of information that was not shared with other individuals and so when the other individuals found that information is for instance in the indiana report officers young report that information was ultimately supplied by third parties outside of gm. Gm did not know they have the information on file and in some wisdom Public Records. You have circumstances where among other things you have the sensitivity to the use of the word saws which might have created for something person that maybe we stayed away from using words which would force people to ask hard questions rather than taking the approach of asking the hard questions to whatever those answers are. We finance us as a pet which had a Significant Impact at least in terms of finding Information Impact on how this investigation of the cobalt switch. It sounds like the old gm calls are was lets dont talk about a problem. Is that what it is without notes and i understand we are both lawyers. You may say i dont want to take notes so gm just put them under the rug and now its coming home to roost. Ms. Barra and our last hearing you referred to the new gm responses to questions the culture would change under your leadership. You test drive created new president filled by jeb buyer and i know you have been with jama number fears and mr. Buyer has been with gm. Yes. So you both worked for the old gm. Can you tell me what is going to be different in the new gm even though everybody in the inspectors congressmen butterfield talked about our gm. You need a culture change and not just verbiage. I completely agree soaping the actions we are taking but i can tell you the men and women of General Motors the vast majority come to work everyday and they want to do a good job. They heard me talk about this report. They are as deeply troubled assignment they are taking action and we are creating a culture. I have evidence of it every day where employees are coming for it. They want to do the right thing. They want to produce highquality safe vehicles. I am vehicles. I move a minute and i agree that needs to continue but i also know that oh dont talk about that, just do your job. That is what has gotten jammed into this position. Your compensation of victims and recognizing that moment of money can replace a loved one or can compensate for someone who is terribly injured. How would fund be it ministers and what would the total be expected to compensate the victims . Again is being run by ken feinberg who is known as an expert in this area. Cdi and the money with mr. Feinberg. I think its important to note that General Motors wants to reach with this Compensation Program everyone who lost a loved one due to this issue or suffered serious physical injury injury and then slowly communicated to mr. Feinberg. Im not. Im out of time but there are a whole lot of gm customers out there you are frustrated because for over a decade they have been loyal and now we are seeing 6,016,000,000 recalls. There is a problem and i hope you have it fixed. Mr. Chairman i hope we can continue this to make sure that it is fixed and i yield back my time. The gentleman yields back and they now recognize mr. Gingrey for five minutes. Ms. Barra i want to ask about a situation that the cobalt. If one of my 21016yearold granddaughters are driving in the cobalt and inadvertently the ignition turns to the accessory position, is they who just got their drivers license three months ago, i would think that their initial reaction would be to try to turn the car back off and start the car up again although its in drive and its not a neutral. With the cars start back up . First of all if they were driving the vehicle and they have the key in the ring this condition should happen. But if it happened. Lets assume that it did happen. Okay so then you have to restart the car. I think the answers you would have to put it in neutral. That would be pretty hard for his 16yearold inexperienced driver. You think of was with an 18wheeler bearing down on them. As i listen and the other hearing you are at several weeks ago General Motors has got to have the best engineers in the world whether they are electrical engineers mechanical engineers, probably both. How when the world would they not know that when the vehicle when the ignition and a partly because of a low torque and it shifts to the accessory position in the engine stalls that would also deactivate the airbags . I would think that kind of testl before a vehicle is approved for sale. How could they not know that . I cant speculate on why they didnt know. I can tell you anytime a vehicle stalls we considered a safety issue and if we find theres a malfunction in a part or a defect in a part that causes the stall to occur. I would say a safety issue indeed is a side to side airbag would not inflate and if somebody got tboned in the middle of an intersection and a young person even an experienced driver of 40 years is not going to think that quickly. Mr. Valukas and i think you alluded to this a few minutes ago. If not for the lawsuit in the picture may be up there on the wall. She is in my district in the 11th Congressional District of georgia. If not for the Burke Mountain lawsuit and she was killed and the fact that her lawyers figured out the ignition switch apart from model year 2008 was different from model years 2005, six and seven in the cobalt, would we even know about this ignition switch problem today . Would we even be aware that . The answer is yes because there was an open and at that point significant investigation going on at that particular point and certainly there was information accumulating as they were Going Forward pointing to the fact that they had these nondeployment and fatalities and the switch has something to do with it. See that smacks of the big cover up to me. After General Motors where did this change that took months for gm and outside experts to confirm there have been a change. Why did this take so long . I dont have a good answer to that. I can tell you from the time of april 2013 when the deposition took place they knew or should have known or they knew at that point that they had to different switches and they gave it to mr. Malarkey the expert and he came back with the confirmation of what they were given in the way of information in october. See when the issue is presented to decisionmakers in december no recall was announced until another month and a half before gm finally decided to recall the cobalt. What information was missing in december that prevented gm or michot no recall at that time . Ms. Barra can you tell me . I cant talk about specific information. We do know that not all the information was presented that meeting. The right information was in front of that group than they did make the right discussion decision. Let me say my concluding 35 seconds, this whole sequence from the time the Company Learned of a potential difference in the parts during the litigation to the time the recall was announced within 10 months ms. Barra y. At the footdragging . Is this typical of gms investigations into a product concerned and power you may can change his . We are already working to recalls to change that process is the most senior levels of the company in public and although i dont want to do because we are going to do what is right for customers and we are demonstrating that. Thank you and i yield back. I should ask clarifying questions. A number of us have asked about the work coverup. Can you do find what the word coverup means mr. Valukas . And assistance while we and assistance what we would force any evidence that individuals do they have a safety issue and took steps to conceal the fact that they have a safety issue. That is what we are looking for in terms of a coverup and we interviewed individuals and ask them questions to gather the facts to see whether or not that it taken place and we sought to tax those facts against the documents we were reviewing so someone is something on a given day we identify that and take steps to see whether whether they conceal what they knew from other individuals and we did not not find out. Is your definition also include the people who slow walked moving on safety issues . Is that also coverup . Pardon me i didnt mean to interrupt. If that a was delivered we done then it would encompass Something Like that. It was a matter of someone being a position for instance when one of the investigators was given the assignment was given a deadline that was given a sense of injury so he put in the queue with other investigations and it took its time. That i not call a coverup. I would call that something other than that. Thank you. Thank you mr. Chairman. Ms. Barra malcolm back welcome back to the committee. I told you a member of my staff had a Chevrolet Malibu that was subject to recall. She found that by going on the web site and no personal notification. She inquired at the dealership how she should proceed and they said there was no fix. I presented you with that celebrities of the time theres a fix whether a check or placement of the product at the fix does exist for that specific vehicle. Well i have here important safety recall that she just received on monday so that is 2. 5 months after you appeared on april 1 never find her of the recall saying that her vehicle makes her into sudden loss of power steering assist and in other language which could result in an increased risk of a crash. It also informed her that the part doesnt exist to fix the product. So when you consider that situation a different vehicle in a different problem with the ignition problem that we have focused on, and you have already said that many of these vehicles will not be fixed, the ignition problem until october. Those parts will be available, what are consumers supposed to do when they are going it. Backup up to six months or longer without any way to fix their vehicle . How can assess the risk . I mean i dont know what my staff should do. I see all the pharmaceutical products that they long list of possible side effects and we have to calculate the risk that way you advise or let your son or driver son or daughter drive these vehicles now at the level of risk that you may know more about than we do . Kobold specifically we have done extensive testing on using and driving the vehicle with the key in the ring and it has validated its faith in their purview that with technical experts admit sandy have concurred experts admit santa concurred somilla that case those vehicles are demonstrating safe to drive. In general people have concerns that go to their dealer and call the customer Engagement Center and we walk them to the specific issue. And many of the recalls we have done its not a part replacement. Its a visual check and depending on what happens what needs to be repaired. So each individual recall has a slightly different to it. I know you talked about the possibility of wonder vehicles and loaner cars and so forth and i understand the difficulty with a supplier gearing up to produce the part that they may not have made in four or five years and they have to all of a sudden come up with several million of them. We have of parts Manufacturing Kentucky in my district that the services peterbilt trucks. I know how much work they have to do but again is there any alternative to, liable alternative to these consumers who face a very important decision . I them about their risk and whether nasa has assessed the risk with regard to power steering assist whether that significant or not but there are a lot of consumers out there that im sure wondering whether they should be driving or not. Again i would encourage them to call her customer Engagement Center or talk to the dealer and we can talk about the specific situation. I have no further questions. I yield to the ranking member. I just wanted to ask you a question ms. Barra says there is oldtime here. You had testified that out of the roughly 2. 6 million of these cars that were recalled you guys have said sense sent 400,000 parts out to the steelers roughly . Us. As of monday it looks like about only 177,000 of these vehicles have been repaired and you had testified a little bit earlier so thats 177,000 vehicles out of 2. 6 million vehicles and we have talked about this before. This is one of our big concerns in this committee is, how do we get those folks to take in those recalled vehicles to be repaired and you said you were looking at some innovative ways to do that. Im wondering if you could just take a few seconds to talk about how gm is trying to get those people to take those cards and . We are doing a lot on social media and we are looking at the populations especially some of these vehicles are older vehicle so we have done Actual Research to figure out what messages would be most compelling to have these individuals come in to get their vehicle specs. I would also say that dealers are working to do specific arrangements with each individuals to make it as convenient as possible to reduce the inconvenience. There are number of steps. See let me ask you then you meet the october 4 and thats a deadline and . We are on track. Ive talked to the ceos of Companies Making his Companies Making his part to make monitored on a daily basis. Mr. Olson for five minutes. I thank the chair and welcome ms. Barra and mr. Valukas. I approach this from the perspective of a naval officer and a pilot. The leaders of the navy are called skippers. Good skippers give credit to others who do good and when good things happen they give credit to others. When bad good skippers give all the credit and take all the blame. By that definition ms. Barra you are a decent skipper that people have died because of gms defective products. As we knew, and mr. Valukass report shows quick clearly those deaths occurred because gm has some problems that cant be fixed overnight. As gms skipper fixing these problems is on you maam squarely upon you. I think you know that. Gm has rebuilt its trust with the American People and part of that trust is being straightforward on the number of deaths that occurred because of these affected cobalt preview of testified that 15 deaths occurred because of these cars. Is that right maam . I testified with the information we have me believe the ignition switch may have been related to 13 but i dont have all the information. Okay because thats a problem. On the wall behind you there 15 photographs of tragedy and loss from cobalt vehicles. That is why we are doing the Compensation Program and will be independently of mustard by mr. Feinberg and i can assure you that i and General Motors want to make sure that anybody who was harmed as a result of the ignition switch defense is a part of that program. I will get that Compensation Fund later. How about the number of injuri injuries, not death but injuries . What is the number . Do you have an idea of . Ballpark . I dont have the specific number. We dont have the complete number but again that is why mr. Feinberg who is an expert at doing his family want to have everybody that suffered serious physical injury or suffer the loss of a loved one we want everyone to be a part of this program. As you know restoring the trust of the American People part of tha is having a viable Compensation Program for victims families. I know you have asked mr. Feinberg to evaluation two evaluating options. My question is this sounds like gm has not put limits on mr. Feinberg. Are there limits on the compensation nor are all options out there . I didnt hear the beginning of your question. The question did you tap mr. Feinberg to have this Compensation Fund and are there any limits on it collects see he is independent and he will determine those who qualify to meet his see what your board of oversight have to approve the recommendations . See he is independent. See have the families had previously reached settlements with gm eligible for this trust fund . They are eligible to apply. See how much do you expect the fund to be . Without doing the protocol i cant speculate on that. We will have to take an appropriate estimate that we really wont know until the program has been fully administered and we have indicated they will share the number of incidents. Is there a chance that fund will be capped . No. No chance. Okay. I yield back. Thank you. Let me ask you ms. Barra do people know how to get in touch with you if they are having trouble getting their car fixed . I again in the letters that we sent and we sent we get Registration Data and thats the best information we have. A national fan database would be helpful to make sure we are reaching them directly but in the Committee Case and we have had theirs information as well as the dealer. So the message should be a person should contact the dealer . They can contact their customer Engagement Center. Theres also a number at the back and 800 number in the back of their Owners Manual but in addition we know many people were contact the dealer. Can you contact us with that 800 number. I am getting a lot of activity on people wanted to know how to get their cars fixed. We now recognize ms. Castor for five minutes. The valukas report refers to the boards commitment to a bonus plan for Corporate Officers and employees at the executive director and supervisor levels. Part of the calculation for whether bonus can be payable was improvement in the quality of gms vehicles. Mr. Valukas do you know what improvement in quality means or how it is quantified for the purposes of this Bonus Calculation and . I can tell you within a quality calculation is supposed to be safety that the individuals which we interviewed identified quality, improvement in quality is related to the safety issues. So safety is supposed to be a quality component but how is that quantified . I dont have an answer for that. Mr. The. Mr. Appointed to receive bonuses to this Bonus Program in the last decade while the ignition switch issues were ongoing with gm . There were many years where there was no bonus pay in several years where there was but i can tell you that the quality component one aspect of it is surveys of which safety is an element of that. So youll provide thes to os the commission . Sure. And will the Bonus Program be revised to include an explicit safety component . It already has safety as a piece of it. I will go back and review to make sure it is explicit. Because he said he reviewed it and hes not certain how expansive it is and what goes in to considerations of safety. I will make sure it is explicit. Its a good suggestion. Will gms Compensation Structure for all employees including below the Leadership Levels now include a safety component . Again, when you speak of all employees, 220,000 employees around the world, we comply with the different laws in those Compensation Programs. But we have sent a strong signal that quality is important and recei represents a 25 across all levels. I would recommend that as part of your overall for all employees to encourage considerations of safety that is made much more explicit to all those employees. In the past, gm has put into place insend i haves for high level employees to make improvements. If gm is serious about its new focus on safety, there should be stronger incentives in place for executives and all of the other gm employees at the very least to identify safety problems and improve the safety of all gms vehicles. Now id like to ask about the and you h adequacy of the recall. They have assured the public that it will fix the position. I hope you can assure me that this is the case. Its been vallu validated extensively and nitshtsa has reviewed it. Issue number one is that the force required to turn the switch is too low. And issue number two is that a drivers knee can hit the key or key fob and turn the switch to the off position because it is placed too low. The fix to the recall will be to install a new ignition switch with higher torque writering more force to turn off the switch, is that correct . Right. But if you look at the switch, cylinder and key and you look at how it works as a system, its been validated to not only talk about the issue that youre talking about about turning, but also the potential knee interference. Both have been validated. What will the torque specification that the new switches will make . What is the new torque specification . The specification is 20 plus or minus five, but the more important thing to look at is the overall performance of the system and thats what weve done. Is that 20 newton centimeters . Yes. And do you know how gm arrived at that specification . That was a specification, but weve gone back and tested extensively with varying levels of keys on rings with varying heights of size of people. Its been an exhausting testing. Heres the concern. When the committee interviewed several gm engineers, they all told us they had no idea of the basis for that specification. And gm has received multiple reports indicating that the placement of the ignition switch in these vehicles could cause a drivers knee to hit the key or the key fob and turn off the switch isnt that right . Neither of those individuals have been a part of the company as we have done or been involved in all of the extensive testing and validation that weve done specifically with the new product Integrity Organization. So theyre really not in a position to comment. But certainly that would raise a concern if your former engineers tip to have concerns over the fix. I dont find mr. Degorgio credible and ive reviewed the testing done by very seasoned engineers and im confident that the right validation has been done of the system in the vehicle. I yield back. Now recognize mr. Griffin for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Ms. Barra, weve talked about the Compensation Trust Fund and you have indicated that mr. Feinberg will set parameters, but you dont have those yet. He will determine who is eligible and hell make the determination as to how much theyre eligible for. Is that correct . Thats correct. And do you know if hes going to determine, is he looking just at because most people have focused just on the air bag deployment and your list of 13 that you know of at this point only includes air bag deployment issues. Do you know if hes looking at other parameters . We have told him we want to make sure anybody who suffered harm, either loss to loved one or suffered serious physical injury because of the defect with the ignition switch, that they should be a part of the program. So you acknowledge that if youre traveling down the highway at a fairly good rate of speed, and all of a sudden your car cargos into a stall, you have to put it in neutral and restart it, that will be responsible for a number of the accidents that took place whether or not the air bags were deployed, there might still have been an injury as a result of that, you acknowledge that . If the ignition switch was part of the issue, we want them in the program and there are other sdipincidents. So i have to question why you have one of the two folks in the incident referred to in trooper youngs accident report, one of those two people is on the list of 13, but the other is not and that raises the question. She was in the back seat. So the air bag doesnt affect her, but clearly that accident made very we may very well have been the result that you had a young driver who suddenly finds themselves in a an emergency situation on the highway going 48 Miles Per Hour and they dont have an engine that works anymore. And you would agree that if the engine is not working, power is off, you dont have power steering any are more, do you. We were clear about the 13. But again, we want to get er