WASHINGTON. D.C. – House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Ranking Member Darrell Issa (R-CA) released the following statement tonight regarding an agreement reached to pass legislation on Wednesday that includes provisions first proposed by Rep. Issa to create an independent and bipartisan panel to study and issue a report on the causes, handling, and way forward from the current financial crisis:

“The pieces are finally in place to do what should have been done at the beginning of this crisis – create an independent commission to investigate the root causes of the financial meltdown and provide nonpartisan recommendations on a way forward.  As Congress and the Administration work to address the financial crisis, it makes sense to have an independent commission examine what went wrong and why.

“We need an honest broker to ask all the questions about what created, shaped, and could have been done to avert this crisis.  The point of this commission isn’t to point fingers and place blame, but rather to identify mistakes so that efforts to restart the economy and avoid a future reoccurrence aren’t misguided. ”

Rep. Issa first introduced legislation to create such a commission last fall and again this past January. H.R. 74, the Financial Oversight Commission Act, was modeled after the 9/11 Commission and the Iraq Study Group.