Rules of Procedure for a Permanent General Assembly
Article 1: Sessions
(1) The General Assembly is convened according to the calendar of sessions.
(2) One session is a 5 weeks cycle organized like this:
- Week 1 and 2: Tabling of motions on the agenda before the Board
- Week 2 and 3: week of debate and amendment
- Week 4: Voting week
Article 2: Tabling of motions
(1) One week before the opening of the tabling of motions the Board sent a reminder email to the Members with the deadlines for the ongoing session.
(2) Motions are tabled before the Board on a dedicated place on PPI’s Discourse.
Motions should at least contain:
A summary of the motion, explaining the reasoning behind the motion, how it should be interpreted. This part should include arguments for the motion but not the motion itself.
- A proposal which is the detailed motion itself.
- The names of the members tabling the motion. The motion must be signed by at least one Ordinary or Observer members to be tabled.
(3) Any motion that does not meet these conditions will be refused.
(4) Any motion which will be tabled, fulfilling the required conditions is entered on the agenda of the General Assembly.
Article 3: Publication of the agenda
(1) At the end of the second week of the session, the Board publishes the final agenda for the session.
Article 4: Amendments
(1) Amendments may be tabled during the weeks of debate with the same conditions as a motion.
(2) Those who have tabled the motion have the option of indicating whether they want to merge their motion with one or more amendments before the closing of debates. If they do not indicate that they want to merge the amendment, the amendment is considered as a counter-proposal.
Article 5: Debates
(1) The motions on the agenda of the General Assembly are transferred to Discourse to be debated in writing.
(2) At the end of the fourth week, the Board organizes a physical or online meeting for debates. At the end of this meeting, all debates and amendment tabling are closed.
Article 6: Oral debates
(1) The Board appoint one chairperson and one vice-chairperson to chair the oral debates. If the chairperson resigns during the meeting, the vice-chairperson replaces it. If the vice-chairperson resigns during meeting, one board member chairs the meeting.
(2) The chairperson leads the proceedings, recognizes speakers and maintains order during the meeting. It can set up speaking time and turn if it judges it necessary. The chairperson cannot participate to the debates.
(3) Requests for the floor by local and remote delegates, PPI Officers and members of the public are acknowledged in the order received. In questionable cases the Chairperson decides.
The chairperson may refuse to allow members of the public to speak if there is not enough time.
(4) The Chairperson can yield the floor to speakers and the person who made the motion also out of turn.
(5) Concerning the remote delegates
A) The Chairperson appoints a proxy person through which the remote delegates may act.
B) The remote delegates may request the floor to make a statement or ask a question by explicitly indicating so. The proxy person will then request the floor on their behalf.
Article 7: Voting procedure
(1) Voting takes place on a tool chooses by the Board according to the present rules and other needs expressed by members.
(2) Voting is electronic and not secret. Voting can be anonymized during the voting period.
(3) According to the statutes the quorum is fixed at two-third of the members.
The quorum is calculated for each motion. There is no count of the quorum before the vote.
(4) In principle, to be adopted, the motion and the nomination must receive an absolute majority of votes.
As an exception, the majority is raised to:
• 2/3 of the voters for the modification of the Rules of Procedures.
• 2/3 of the voters for the creation of committees.
• 2/3 of the voters for the modification of the Statutes
(5) The majority is calculated by the repartition of the yes and the no. Abstain is not count in the final result.
(6) If several motions or nomination are competing the delegates vote by ranking the proposition from the more favourite to the least favourite.
For competing motions, the one which is the most favourite of all is adopted.
For competing nomination, every position available is fulfil with the candidates that are the best ranked.
Article 8: Miscellaneous
(1) A motion can only be modified or deleted by the Permanent Assembly in accordance with the voting procedures under which it was added.