mr. speaker , first of all , i want to thank my colleagues , the gentleman from wisconsin ( mr. kind ) xz4002180 and the gentleman from new jersey ( mr. andrews ) xz4000080 , for offering this substitute . 
i live in the city of cleveland . 
we have a great organization representing many of our smaller enterprises called cose , and cose has come together in an attempt to provide health care coverage to small businesses . 
i wanted to vote for a piece of legislation that will allow small business to have insurance policies for their people , but i did not want to vote for a plan that did not provide the same kind of coverage that everybody else has , meaning that it did not have to be responsible for state insurance regulations as did other policies . 
so by presenting this amendment , the gentleman from wisconsin ( mr. kind ) xz4002180 and the gentleman from new jersey ( mr. andrews ) xz4000080 have offered me an opportunity to say to the small businesses in my community , i support you , and i want to make sure you can provide health care coverage to your employees . 
what is also of particular concern to me is that offering something that does not provide the same safeguards is like offering nothing . 
all we have to do is go back and look at the mewas , the multiple employer welfare arrangement , i guess that is what they call them , the multiple employer welfare arrangements , which have been used by employers as vehicles to provide benefits . 
the public record is filled with instances where they have failed , left employees and employers alike with unpaid medical bills . 
mr. speaker , the other thing that we have to look at is , and the prior speaker said something about subsidies , and you give them to people , and they do not get anything in return . 
we gave subsidies to the drug companies in the medicare prescription drug bill , and they got money that they did not even have to use towards a prescription benefit . 
so do not talk to me about subsidizing anything . 
let us make sure that the people of america and the small businesses have an opportunity to have health care . 
if we do preventive health care , we would not have so many people coming into hospitals with acute problems because they have not had any prevention . 
it is so wonderful that we have a substitute that offers coverage to small employers . 
vote for the substitute and vote against h.r. 525 , the small business fairness act . 
