By a 408-0 vote, the House of Representatives approved a veterans’ cost-of-living adjustment bill on Tuesday that ought to be noncontroversial but has an unexpected problem.

The bill, HR 4843, provides for a Dec. 1 increase in veterans disability and survivors benefits that will match the automatic increases in Social Security and military retired pay. The increase, which will not be known for certain until late October, is expected to be between 2.2 percent and 2.6 percent. The gap is the result of uncertainty about what might happen for the rest of the year with gasoline and energy prices, which have been a major factor in rising consumer prices.

Rep. Steve Buyer, R-Ind., the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee chairman, said about 2.6 million disabled veterans and 340,000 surviving spouses and children would receive the increase.

Last year, the COLA was estimated to be 2.7 percent when the House first approved the increase, only to have the amount ending up being 4.1 percent in veterans’ disability checks.

“I do not know what it is going to be this year,” Buyer said. “Even though we are saying approximately 2.2, I do not know what it is going to be.”

“No amount of money can ever compensate our veterans for the loss of their health or the families for the loss of a loved one,” said Rep. Tom Udall, D-N.M., a veterans’ committee member. “Nonetheless, it is critical that the monetary value of these benefits, which partly compensate for such losses, is not reduced merely by the passage of time.”

Under the congressional budget process, lawmakers approving the veterans’ COLA bill do not have to figure out how to pay for it because the federal budget sent to Congress in February by the Bush administration assumes disability compensation for those with service-connected disabilities and dependency and indemnity compensation for survivors would be increasing to match inflation.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates the cost of the increase at about $530 million. It would take effect Dec. 1 and first appear in January checks, assuming Congress passes and President Bush signed the COLA bill on time.

Controversy hovers around the bill, though, because it also provides for a COLA increase in the relatively new $250 monthly pay for the dependent children of deceased service members. The $250 payment is paid for two years after a service-connected death as a transition benefit. The payment would increase to about $255 under an amendment to the bill proposed by Rep. Shelly Berkley, D-Nev., that was approved by the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee last week.

The Bush budget did not include an increase in the children’s survivors pay, which means the Berkley amendment causes a small budget gap of about $200,000 in 2007. The bill does not include a way to pay for that small increase, assuming the money would come out of the Department of Veterans Affairs budget for compensation and pensions. That assumption, however, leaves the possibility the bill could be blocked later by a budgetary point of order.

The Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee approved a similar veterans’ COLA bill last week, but without the increase in the $250 surviving child benefit.