Republicans force second vote on US health bill

Republicans in the Senate have forced a second vote on Barack Obama’s healthcare bill in the lower House of Representatives.

The Senate has been deliberating on amendments to the bill and it could be back in Congress tonight for a vote in time for politicians to go off on a holiday recess this weekend with business concluded.

President Obama has already signed the bill into law, but the Republicans staged a Senate ambush yesterday forcing debate on 30 amendments which dragged on into the small hours, when two minor procedural errors were unearthed, forcing the bill back to Congress.

The new vote is a political reverse for the Democrats. The bill passed only narrowly at the start of the week, and has been greeted with great hostility by its critics. However Democrats complain that none of the Republicans’ amendments were seeking to improve the legislation, and were instead an attempt to destroy it.

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