[LEAPSECS] ITU-R discussion process?

[Poul-Henning Kamp]

In message <726CD181-CFAD-4F41-8A14-792365CECB37 at noao.edu>, Rob Seaman writes:


>Could somebody in the know comment on the process that will likely

>be followed at the ITU Radiocommunication Assembly in Geneva in

>January to debate and decide the UTC question(s)?  Not only does

>it appear that the proposed text is not publicly available, it isn't

>obvious how and under what circumstances this text might change

>during deliberations.


I talked to one who has been there back in the 1980ies, and he said
that it is an incredibly boring process, slogging through often
hundreds of proposals a day, the vast majority of them, sometimes
all of them, being approved by uanimous concent, because all the
wrangling takes place out-of-band to save on-agenda time.

They have something akin to Robers Rules Of Order, only it's an
UN-variant which has adaptations for multiple languages (You cannot
raise a proposal in Swahili or Danish and expect to get a vote right
away etc.)

He didn't remember any recommendations being ammended, in plenum,
unless they were administrative of nature (How much money for the
ITU printing office and new headquarters etc).

So his guess was that "the TF460 proposal comes up, people wave
their paddles, and that's the end of it"

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