[council] Amendments to GNSO Council Motions

["Jonathan Robinson" <jrobinson@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

All,

 

During the last GNSO Council meeting, we dealt with the issue of amendments
to motions that were considered 'unfriendly'. Having checked the GNSO
Operating Procedures, I see that the practice that has been used by the
Council over the last few years is actually not incorporated there. 

 

The question therefore is whether this should be the case or whether we are
comfortable with leaving this as a practice? Any amendments to motions that
are not considered friendly by the original maker of the motion (and the
seconder?) are currently submitted to a simple majority vote.  If the vote
passes, the motion is amended accordingly and if not, the proposed amendment
is discarded. If we do believe this should be incorporated into the GNSO
Operating Procedures, one option would be to pass this on as a narrowly
scoped issue to the SCI.  Alternatively, mark this as one of the items that
needs to go on the list of items that will need to be addressed when the
recommendations of the upcoming GNSO Review are implemented. 

 

Should the Council wish to pass this on to the SCI, it could be scoped along
the following lines:

 

'The GNSO Council has a standing practice of considering formally proposed
amendments to motions by requesting the maker (and the seconder) of the
motion to consider whether or not the proposed amendment is considered
'friendly'. If the amendment is considered 'friendly' by the maker of the
motion and the seconder, the motion is amended accordingly and the amended
motion is then considered by the GNSO Council. If the proposed amendment is
not considered 'friendly' by the maker of the motion the proposed amendment
is put to a vote (if the seconder objects, he/she may choose to withdraw
their name as the seconder of the motion). If it meets the simple majority
threshold, the motion is amended accordingly and the amended motion is then
considered by the GNSO Council. If it does not meet the simple majority
threshold, the amendment is discarded and the original motion is then
considered by the GNSO Council. The GNSO Council would like to incorporate
this practice into the GNSO Operating Procedures and as such requests the
SCI to propose the appropriate language as well as section in order to do
so'.

 

I look forward to any feedback you may wish to provide on the above.  

 

In addition, the formal definition of the role of a seconder of a motion may
need some work but I suggest we deal first with the issue of motion
amendments.

 

Thanks.

 

 

Jonathan