미국 오바마대통령 "군수계약 백지수표 시대 끝나"

버락 오바마 미 대통령은 4일 연방 정부 차원의 조달계약 체계 개선을 지시하면서 특히 국방예산 낭비를 줄이고 조달계약 과정에 반드시 더 많은 경쟁이 도입되어야 한다고 강조했다.    오바마 대통령은 백악관에서 민주당 칼 레빈 상원 국방위원회 위원장과 존 매케인 상원의원 등이 참석한 가운데 조달계약 개선 명령에 서명하면서 "군수 계약업자들에게 백지수표를 주는 시대는 끝났다" 면서 "우리는 계약과정에 더 많은 경쟁과 더불어 계약 이행에 더 많은 감시를 필요로 한다"고 밝혔다.    그는 "우리는 필요하지 않은 것들에 지출하고 있다"며 "우리는 지급해야 할 것보다 많은 돈을 내고 있다. 이것은 전적으로 용납할 수 없다"고 강조했다.    이는 군수물자 계약이 부풀려져 예산낭비를 가져오고 있다는 점을 지적한 것으로 이번 조달계약 개선이 국방분야에 초점이 맞춰 있음을 보여주는 것이다.    오바마 대통령은 또 이러한 예산절감 노력은 경제회복뿐만 아니라 다음 세대에 산더미 같은 재정 적자를 물려주지 않기 위해서라도 필요하다며 무책임한 예산의 시대를 끝낼 때가 됐다고 덧붙였다.    오바마 대통령은 이번에 조달계약 체계를 뜯어고쳐 일부 정부 업무의 아웃소싱(외부용역)과 경쟁이 없는 수의계약을 중단시켜 한 해 400억달러의 예산을 절감하겠다는 목표를 제시했다.    jaehong@yna.co.kr (끝)

Priorities -- Not lining the pockets of contractors

Last week the President laid out the foundation of a new vision for our budget and the way government does business. It is a vision based not on ideology, but on the idea that we can and must invest boldly in our future while also making the hard choices and being vigilant to bring in a new era of fiscal responsibility.

 

Last week began with the fiscal responsibility summit, where the President and members of Congress came together to generate ideas to get the country on a sustainable long-term track. One of the exchanges that got the most attention was between the President and Senator John McCain, who discussed the idea of procurement overruns, in Defense Department contracts in particular.

 

Today Sen. McCain joined the President again to develop that idea further, along with Senators Carl Levin and Claire McCaskill and Representatives Edolphus Towns and Peter Welch. The President signed a Presidential Memorandum that will reform government contracting by strengthening oversight and management of taxpayer dollars, ending unnecessary no-bid and cost-plus contracts and maximizing the use of competitive procurement processes, and clarifying rules prescribing when outsourcing is and is not appropriate. The OMB will be tasked with giving guidance to every agency on making sure contracts serve the taxpayers, not the contractors.

 

In addition, the President endorsed the goals of the bipartisan effort on defense procurement reform led by Senators Carl Levin and McCain, and has asked Defense Secretary Gates to work with the Senators going ahead. In his remarks, President Obama made clear that while there are those who will try to protect contractor excesses behind cries of weakening our national defenses, there will be a bipartisan, firm stand to put those excesses to an end:

 

The American people's money must be spent to advance their priorities -- not to line the pockets of contractors or to maintain projects that don't work.

 

Recently that public trust has not always been kept.  Over the last eight years, government spending on contracts has doubled to over half a trillion dollars.  Far too often, the spending is plagued by massive cost overruns, outright fraud, and the absence of oversight and accountability.  In some cases, contracts are awarded without competition.  In others, contractors actually oversee other contractors.  We are spending money on things that we don't need, and we're paying more than we need to pay.  And that's completely unacceptable.

 

This problem cuts across the government, but I want to focus on one particular example, and that is the situation in defense contracting.  Now, I want to be clear, as Commander-in-Chief, I will do whatever it takes to defend the American people, which is why we've increased funding for the best military in the history of the world.  We'll make new investments in 21st century capabilities to meet new strategic challenges.  And we will always give our men and women the -- in uniform, the equipment and the support that they need to get the job done.

 

But I reject the false choice between securing this nation and wasting billions of taxpayer dollars.  And in this time of great challenges, I recognize the real choice between investments that are designed to keep the American people safe and those that are designed to make a defense contractor rich.

 

Last year, the Government Accountability Office, GAO, looked into 95 major defense projects and found cost overruns that totaled $295 billion.  Let me repeat:  That's $295 billion in wasteful spending.  And this wasteful spending has many sources.  It comes from investments and unproven technologies.  It comes from a lack of oversight.  It comes from influence peddling and indefensible no-bid contracts that have cost American taxpayers billions of dollars.
 

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/09/03/04/priorities_not-lining-the-Pockets-of-Contractors/