Snowed out!

Chairman Edolphus “Ed” Towns (D-NY) and Ranking Member Darrell Issa (R-CA) have rescheduled tomorrow’s  hearing by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform titled: “Toyota Gas Pedals: Is the Public at Risk?”

The hearing will now take place on Wednesday, February 24 at 10:00 a.m.

The latest move, likely not the result of behind the scenes maneuvering in lobbyist-dominated Washington, gives the beleaguered Japanese automaker and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration more time to prepare for what will be grueling questioning over their conduc, contradictory statements and lack of action on safety matters involving unintended acceleration, sticking gas pedals and failed brakes on a growing number of now  millions of Toyota  and Lexus vehicles.

However, time cuts both ways, as it will give the U.S. Senate a chance to pre-empt the House in the interim. Thus far, no Senate hearings have been scheduled, but the snow storm, and storm of controversy surrounding Toyota creates a political opportunity here.

The House hearing, one of two scheduled,  when it comes off  is also supposed to “gain a better understanding of the nature of the sudden acceleration problem in Toyota vehicles and what should be done about it.”

“Due to the inclement weather set to impact the DC Metropolitan area tonight and tomorrow, Ranking Member Issa and I have agreed to reschedule the hearing on the Toyota gas pedal recall,” said Chairman Towns. “I look forward to hearing from our witnesses on February 24th.”    Both Raymond LaHood, the U.S. Secretary of Transportation, and David Strickland the Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration were scheduled to testify early in the session.

They will face tough questioning on what government regulators knew about the problems, when they knew it and why – if critics are listened to – it took so long to do something about the problem. They will also be asked if the fixes Toyota has proposed are adequate.

LaHood has been quite amusing if you have caught him on network television trying to explain why he backed off from his earlier statement that said  people should stop driving the affected vehicles.

Appearing after LaHood and Strickland in the glare of the television lights was supposed to be Yoshimi Inaba, President and CEO of Toyota Motor North America.

The snow storm raises an interesting issue — it was surprising to me that the committee had not demanded that Akio Toyoda  appear, especially  since he spoke out on Toyota’s problems at a press conference in Nagoya, Japan last Friday. Now there is clearly enough time to get him to the U.S.

In the event, Inaba and whoever sits with him from Toyota will face the same questions as NHTSA, as well as ones about contradictory earlier statements from Toyota alleging the problem was one of entrapped floor mats and was contained to a limited number of vehicles.

Not only was the number of vehicles recalled ultimately expanded, but also a second recall was instituted for what Toyota claims is a separate pedal design issue. This recall has now also been expanded to cover vehicles in Europe and Asia as well.

In addition, allegations are growing about more acceleration problems, as well as brake failures on Toyota’s flagship Prius hybrid, which itself, along with the Lexus HS 250H and Toyota Camry are now also subject to brake or steering failure recalls.