STATE HEALTH PLAN PRESERVED

An attempt to repeal the key provision of Massachusetts' first-in-the-nation universal health insurance law failed Wednesday as House Speaker George Keverian, (D) of Everett offered an amendment preserve it. Keverian saved the bill's key provision - a mandate that businesses with six or more employees provide health insurance worth $1,680 to each worker or pay an equal amount to the state - by delaying its effect until 1993.