Re: [council] Draft GNSO Council Operating Procedures - abstentions
I support.
Kristina Rosette
Covington & Burling LLP
1201 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20004-2401
voice: 202-662-5173
direct fax: 202-778-5173
main fax: 202-662-6291
e-mail: krosette@xxxxxxx
This message is from a law firm and may contain information that is confidential or legally privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, please immediately advise the sender by reply e-mail that this message has been inadvertently transmitted to you and delete this e-mail from your system. Thank you for your cooperation.
-------------------------
Sent from my Wireless Handheld
From: owner-council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx <owner-council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: 'Council GNSO' <council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Mon Sep 21 03:47:24 2009
Subject: [council] Draft GNSO Council Operating Procedures - abstentions
Fellow Council
Members,
Background
one issue debated
but unresolved by the drafting team is the oddity in Council voting over
abstentions.
To date an
abstention has counted as a vote against the motion because of the way the old
by-laws were written.
I believe this is no
longer the case in the new by-laws and so the decision is up to us as Council as
to what we want to put in our internal rules (the operating
procedures).
The current draft
continues the old practise.
Proposal
I would like to
propose an amendment to the draft op. procedures as follows:
5.4
"Abstentions will count towards the establishment of a quorum but do
not count as votes cast."
This will mean an
abstention is just that a decision to not vote. At present it is not the
case.(The ability to state why a member abstains remains).
The only rationale for
the current situation is the the same rule applies for the Board. To my mind
there are reasons why a Board may have such a rule that are not relevant to a
policy development body such as Council.
Is everyone happy
to make this change ?
Philip