(Host) In the final weeks of the legislative session, tempers can get short as the days grow long.

There was an example of that today when the Senate president accused a prominent lobbyist for IBM of lying about a Vermont Yankee decommissioning bill.

VPR's John Dillon reports:

(Dillon) It started out as a normal news conference. Business groups and their supporters jammed the Statehouse to criticize a bill that affects the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant.

The bill says that if Yankee is transferred or sold to a new limited liability corporation, then the new company has to make sure it can cover the full cost of dismantling the plant. That could mean the new corporation has to put up a bond or line of credit totaling $300 million.

Yankee is owned by the Entergy Corporation. And John O'Kane, a lobbyist for IBM, says Entergy will pass on the additional cost in the form of higher rates. He says Yankee is obligated to cover the full cost of decommissioning.

(OKane) The money is there. The money is growing. It will be there for an orderly decommissioning. And a lot of this just nonsense.

(Dillon) So O'Kane and the other business groups were saying what's bad for Vermont Yankee is bad for Vermont business. It's a message they've delivered many times before.

But then Senate President Peter Shumlin stepped up to challenge O'Kane. Shumlin said the bill would not raise rates for Vermonters. The two got into a brief argument.

O'Kane "Money has time value, and you're changing the time..

Shumlin: "We are not asking for the money. You're lying about that. We are not asking for the money. The bill says..."

O'Kane: "Peter, that is.. You just called me a liar.."

Shumlin: "I said you're not telling the truth about that, John."

O'Kane: "You called me a liar. That is unacceptable. You're the president of the Senate, and you're calling me, a representative of the largest employer..."

Shumlin: "You're representing what is not true, John, to the public..".

(Dillon) Then Governor Jim Douglas waded in to the fray. Douglas said he called up IBM to apologize. Here's Douglas spokesman Jason Gibbs.

(Gibbs) What Mr. O'Kane was saying is true, and he was expressing the point of view of Vermont's largest employer, which in the governor's view should be respected and understood.

(Dillon) Shumlin said later that he didn't mean to accuse O'Kane personally of lying.

(Shumlin) I did not suggest that John O'Kane was lying. I said that the folks who are spinning that tale are not telling the truth.

(Dillon) If all this sounds familiar, it is. Last year, at the end of the session, the same players lined up in a similar dispute over Vermont Yankee. The issue then was a tax on the plant, which Governor Douglas eventually vetoed.

Shumlin says it's Entergy that is changing the rules now, by transferring ownership to a new corporation. He warns the new company may not have the financial backing to cover the full cost of decommissioning. And he got in his own political dig at Douglas.

(Shumlin) When it's a question of do Vermonters get protected, or does Entergy get protected, the governor every time votes with the Louisiana wealthy company.

(Dillon) The Senate has already passed the decommissioning bill. The House will vote later this week. And then, like last year, the governor may veto it.

For VPR News, I'm John Dillon.