What should be done? Speculation and answers, maybe, this week.
Chairman Edolphus Towns (D-NY) has announced additional witnesses for a Congressional hearing this Wednesday afternoon, “Toyota Gas Pedals: Is the Public at Risk?”
The hearing opens as Toyota has begun mailing letters to owners of recalled vehicles to let them know when to bring their vehicles into a dealership for a 30-minute repair for sticking accelerator pedals. It is expected that this recall will take months, or even longer, to accomplish.
Toyota’s five North American factories are once again producing vehicles after a one-week hiatus and affected recalled models are also on sale again. This will be subject to some debate as existing owners wait to be notified for when and how their vehicles will be fixed.
The Oversight Committee claims it will examine the Federal government’s response to the recall of millions of Toyota vehicles due to reports of malfunctioning gas pedals, and to gain a “better understanding” of the sudden acceleration problem in Toyota vehicles and what should be done about it. (Click here for a flinty-eyed view of the hearing process.)
“There appears to be growing public concern regarding which Toyota vehicles may be problematic and how people should respond. Consumers want to know whether their cars are safe to drive and, if not, they need to know what to do about it,” said Chairman Towns.
Both Raymond LaHood, the U.S. Secretary of Transportation, and David Strickland
the Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration are 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 areheeded – it took so long to do something about the problems. They will also be asked if the fixes Toyota has proposed are adequate, and are final.
No bouquets coming Inaba's way this week.
Appearing next in the glare of the television lights will be Yoshimi Inaba, President and CEO of Toyota Motor North America.
It is surprising that the committee has not demanded Akio Toyoda appear, since he spoke out on Toyota’s problems at a press conference in Nagoya, Japan last Friday.
Inaba, and whoever sits with him from Toyota, will face the same questions, 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.
Another panel will be comprised of safety advocates. We also advise readers to be skeptical of this group starting with Joan Claybrook, the Former Administrator National Highway Traffic Administration. Claybrook at NHTSA was the one who promulgated an aggressive airbag safety standard over the protests — and data — of automakers that resulted in decapitated children, until common sense prevailed and the automaker proposal for less powerful airbags was belatedly instituted.
Also appearing will be Sean Kane of Safety Research and Strategies, Inc., a well-known supplier of information, critics say selectively culled, for product liability lawyers who sue auto companies for a living and keep a large amount of the proceeds for themselves instead of passing it onto victims they claim to represent.
Kane, not coincidentally, has just released a report, funded by lawyers, that alleges, among other things, that that neither Toyota, nor the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has identified all of the causes of sudden unintended acceleration in Toyota and Lexus model vehicles.
Kane also claims that since 1999, at least 2,262 Toyota and Lexus owners have reported to NHTSA, the media, the courts and to his company that their vehicles have accelerated “suddenly and unexpectedly” in a variety of scenarios.
According to Kane, these incidents have resulted in 815 crashes, 341 injuries and, 19 deaths potentially related to sudden unintended acceleration.
All this is leading up to a lively hearing (unless you’re a worried Toyota owner), but whether it goes anywhere beyond that is debatable, as both Toyota and NHTSA are racing to institute a variety of fixes. And neither institution has any incentive to let this controversy drag on. The same cannot be said for the product liability lawyers.