WASHINGTON -- General Motors CEO Mary Barra said Monday she still does not know why its took years for the automaker to recall cars with dangerously faulty ignitions, but pledged to find out.
In testimony prepared for a Congressional hearing Tuesday into the ignition problem, which has been tied to 13 deaths, Barra promised to be "fully transparent" over what kept GM (IW 500/5) from addressing the problem for 10 years.
She said management would take responsibility for the issue, and that GM "will do the right thing."
Once his report is in, she said, "My management team and I will use his findings to help assure this does not happen again. We will hold ourselves fully accountable."
Barra did not say how the company would address the claims and lawsuits against GM by people injured, or the families of those killed, in accidents allegedly involving the faulty ignitions.
In principle, the government's rescue of the company and taking it through bankruptcy reorganization in 2008-2009 may have indemnified it against claims dating to before the bankruptcy.
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2014
