Mary T. Barra, the chief executive of General Motors and David Friedman, the acting head of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, are among the witnesses to appear at a Senate hearing Wednesday investigating why it took more than a decade for G.M. and the nation’s auto regulatory agency to address a defect that has been linked to 13 deaths and prompted a recall of 2.6 million cars.
As our colleagues, Matthew L. Wald and Bill Vlasic report, Ms. Barra and Mr. Friedman appeared on Tuesday before a House panel. At the hearing, Ms. Barra struck an apologetic tone and announced the company was open to compensating victims. But she did not offer specific information about why G.M. failed to fix a faulty ignition switch.
Auto-Refresh: ON Turn ON Refresh Now Feed Twitter 11:00 A.M. Senator McCaskill Accuses G.M. Officials of Cover-UpMary T. Barra, chief executive of General Motors, faced sharp questions from both Republican and Democratic Senators on the subcommittee on consumer protection, product safety and insurance of the Commerce Committee.
Senator Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri and chairwoman of the subcommittee, referred to the now-familiar action by GM of changing the ignition switch on the Chevrolet Cobalt but not changing the part number.
That action has now required GM to recall many more vehicles and replace the switches, because it does not know if they use the old, weak one or the newer, slightly stronger one.
GM says this was an error but Ms. McCaskill was blunter. She said it was “a cover-up†to hide the original problem.
She was also plain about labeling the action by GM engineer, Ray DeGiorgio, who testified in a suit against the company that he knew nothing about the change in the switch, but whom the House committee found had signed off on it.
“He lied,†she said. And the problem was with GM, she said, which had “ A culture that allowed an engineer at GM to lie under oath, repeatedly lie under oath.â€
The ranking Republican on the committee, Dean Heller of Nevada, who noted that he has raced cars, said it was “incredibly unusual†for a company to change a part without changing a part number.
Perhaps the company, then approaching bankruptcy, was trying to avoid a recall because it did not think the company would survive it, he said.
â€" Matthew L. Wald
10:39 A.M. Senators Ask Why G.M. Failed to Act SoonerOn Wednesday morning, the hearing moved across Capitol Hill to the Senate side. Family members of victims were among those who filled the hearing room. Some people wore t-shirts with images of a victim. Several people held up framed photos of teenagers killed in car crashes.
Senator Claire McCaskill, a Democrat from Missouri, said in her opening statement that she wanted to understand why G.M. and the auto regulatory agency failed to address the defect for more than 10 years.
Jay Rockefeller, Democrat of West Virginia, chairman of the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, said in his prepared opening statement that it was “deeply frustrating and outrageous†for another safety defect to be so widespread, four years after the problems with Toyota’s unintended acceleration problems.
Speaking of a hearing he held on the Toyota problems, he said, “I can literally reread my statement form that hearing word for word.â€
“Once again, it seems an auto company that should be focused on building the safest fleet of vehicles disregarded a serious safety risk. And once again, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has found itself caught flat-footed, surprised by a recall that it, too, should have seen coming,†his statement said.
â€" Matthew L. Wald
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