Incoming Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton said he will pursue repeal of health care reform and expects the process to begin with a repeal vote in the House early this year.

“As part of our pledge we said that we would bring up a vote to repeal health care early. That’ll happen before the president’s State of the Union address,” the Michigan Republican said.

Upton said he expects “a significant number of Democrats to join us” in voting to repeal the law, and he then hopes to pressure the Democratic-controlled Senate to do the same. He said he thinks the House may have a big enough majority to override a presidential veto of the repeal.

If that process doesn’t succeed, though, Upton said he would go after the law “piece by piece,” focusing first on dismantling the most controversial provisions.

Upton and Darrell Issa, the incoming chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, stressed the need for more oversight of executive branch regulations in 2011. Issa, a Republican from California, said he would look for ways to cut government waste.

“The sooner the administration figures out that the enemy is the bureaucracy and the wasteful spending, not the other party, the better off we’ll be,” he said.