OFFICIAL: January 2006 Clark is online

[King John]

The January 2006 Clark, containing several complex and important legislative proposals, is available on the website and here. I am also emailing a copy to each Senator and MC.

Senators and MCs, please don't vote until tomorrow, January 1; and please vote before close of business on January 21. You may vote here on the Ziu board, or in any other way you can devise for communicating your votes to me. (Yes George, I even count votes given verbally over beers!)

— John Woolley, UrN, Secretary of State

[Hooligan]

If it please the Ziu and the Chancery.

The discovery by the esteemed Secretary of State on 1 January 2006 of a great many previously uncatalogued laws, most notably 24RZ19, which established a University of Talossa, has prompted me to make an extraordinary request. Ladies and gentlemen, submitted above my name as their principal sponsor are two proposals, "The Opposition Leader Abolition Act" and "The Royal Household Cleaning Act," both of which I find have been affected in some way by the sudden appearance of some of the acts of the 24th Cosâ, now catalogued.

I ask whether it may be possible to consider allowing the Chancery to make the following changes to the two acts in question. If the lateness of this extraordinary request is such that these two officers deem the changes may not take place, or if it is indeed inorganic to make changes at this time (though I note that at the time of this writing, it is still 1 January, the deadline for the submission of the Clark), I regret that it may be proper to withdraw these acts from immediate consideration, and introduce them, as amended, for the February Clark.

• Add to the Opposition Leader Abolition Act a clause repealing that portion of 24RZ19 which calls for the Opposition Leader to appoint a regent of the University of Talossa.
  
• Modify the Royal Household Cleaning Act such that the mentioned Royal Geographic Society, which had been a newly considered Office of the Royal Household, become the (now discovered as already extant) University of Talossa, making the Regent of the University the mentioned Officer of the Royal Household, and amending to the selfsame duties described for the Royal Geographic Society (which may be accomplished by a Department of Geography among the man colleges to be created in the University) the mandate to provide higher education. The intention of the Royal Household Cleaning Act is to provide a complete list of all non-governmental posts, and the discovery of 24RZ19 would make the act as proposed incomplete in this respect, and would infer that the University is to be abolished, or that the Regent is no longer appointed by the Seneschál. I believe that it is fortuitous that our Secretary of State has discovered this law before this unfortunate eventuality could have come to pass.

As Senator for Vuode, I humbly petition the Mençéi and Secretary of State to determine a course of action such that the provisions of 24RZ19 can be honoured by the Royal Household Cleaning Act, and full and proper weight given, as a non-political appointment of the Seneschál and therefore an Officer of the Royal Household, to the Regent of the newly-rediscovered University.

Lord Hooligan

[King John]

My Lord, esteemed colleagues —

One point in this confusion seems clear to me — the Organic Law does not allow additions or modifications to the Clark after the "calendar month" preceding its publication. (The deadline for the January Clark, that is, was 11:59 PM on 31 December.)

I see two courses we can reasonably take.

1. We could just agree to vote against 35RZ24 and 35RZ28, and then submit modified versions of them to the February Clark.

2. Or we could go ahead and consider both bills in their present form. Then, if they pass, we could later amend 35RZ24, and pass another law amending the newly-discovered 24RZ19 to remove the Opposition Leader's appointment of a Regent of the University. This is the approach I would recommend.

This kind of problem is going to keep happening until we have a reasonably complete compilation of Talossan law. We should, I believe, just do our best in our various stages of gradually illuminated igorance, fix our legal problems as we become aware of them, and forge ahead bravely.

And by the way, if anyone has copies of old Clarks or old compilations of laws sitting around, or even old reports of which proposed laws passed in the Ziu and which didn't, the Chancery and the Royal Talossan Bar (with both of which I find myself honoured to be associated) would be most glad to have copies of whatever you can provide.

— John Woolley, UrN, Secretár d'Estat, ChRTB, Senator (Florenciâ), MC

[Hooligan]

Lord President Castiglhâ, Fellow Senators, members of the Cosâ:

I thank the Secretary of State for his explanation concerning the courses of action available to us to reconcile the newly discovered existence of 24RZ19 and the University of Talossa chartered thereby with the Royal Household Cleaning Act and the Opposition Leader Abolition Act now being considered by our two houses.

Acting on this recommendation, I rise to urge my fellow legislators to vote Për on those two acts, to enact them into law, and to inform the houses that I have placed in the Hopper a draft of an act, entitled The Royal Household Cleaning Cleanup Act, which I hope to submit for consideration by us in the February Clark. This act, providing that the two acts I mentioned which are now before us are approved, will recharter the University of Talossa, and empower the Royal House to appoint, on recommendation of the Seneschál, its governing Regent.

I thank the houses for their time and attention, and I yield the floor.

[Lord Q]

I agree. This would be the easiest and best course of action.