Q&A 2009-041; Published: 16 December 2009
Question:
Will the Q&A Panel confirm or correct decisions made by international juries?
Answer:
No. The role of the Q&A Panel is to promote an understanding of the rules and the use of correct procedures. The Race Officials Committee and the Racing Rules Committee have both concluded that serving as the equivalent of an appeals committee to confirm or otherwise correct* a jury's decision is neither desirable nor appropriate and neither the ISAF Regulations nor the Racing Rules of Sailing provide for the Panel to carry out that function.
You could say this is in line with rule 70.4.
And, if the answer would have been yes, an international jury would no longer be non-appealable!
*NB: I added one word, presumed missing.
The word 'correct' is not required.
ReplyDeleteThe sentence makes sense without it.
I think it is quite dangerous to add words to official documents as this could (but not in this case)substantially change the meaning.
@Anonymous
ReplyDeleteThen "confirm or otherwise" is in English an acceptable use of words? To me this sounds wrong, but then it's not my first language, so what do I know?
Lets find more archaic words to confuse the rest of the world, shall we?
In principle I agree with not adding to Q&As
I would interpret "confirm or otherwise" as an overly fancy way of saying "confirm, overrule, or abstain from ruling" and therefore agree that the additional word changes the meaning.
ReplyDeleteummm, yea let's not add words but there is clearly an ommission here. since when is "otherwise" an infinitive verb?
ReplyDeleteThis grammar disturbs my American English ear as well. I would guess, though, that the author had no idea that he was using an unusual construction.
ReplyDeleteWhen writing SIs or protest decisions, and I want to check that what I have written is clear I try and translate it into another language (in my case French and, occasionally, Welsh), then translate back in to English. If I get back to the original text then I beleive that the original is clear and unambiguous. If you a fluent in several languages try this. You could try translating from English to American - but I have rarely met anyone who is fluent in both of these languages!
ReplyDeleteThis method has lead me to abandon several common formulations - a particular bête noir being "outer limit mark" used by Anglo-Saxon race officials to describe the pin end start mark. "Outer limit mark" should only be used to describe a mark that limits the length of a line defined by a transit.
Gordon