[CCWG-ACCT] Declaration issued in the Booking.com v ICANN IRP

[Bruce Tonkin]

Hello Greg,

>>    I think it is enough to say that it was not intended to allow any challenge to a decision on the merits, so whether a decision is good or bad is irrelevant to this mechanism. 

>>  If the community wants a mechanism that goes directly to the merits of a decision (as opposed to "back door" challenges to procedure), this ain't it.  

>>  If the community wants a mechanism that goes directly to the merits of a decision, then it's up to this group at this time to push forward toward that goal.

Yes – I think that is a good summary.  The IRP panel came to similar conclusions as the Board Governance Committee and the Board.   You can see some of the discussions reflected in the new gTLD programme committee minutes that were quoted by the IRP panel.

The current reconsideration process tends to focus on whether the ICANN policies, and with respect to new gTLDs whether the  processes in the guidebook were followed.   There is not currently an appeals process that allows re-looking at the case based on the merits.

If we look at the UDRP process for example, either party in the dispute can take the matter to court and the court will basically make a decision based on the merits .      The courts is a much more expensive process - but it does allow examination on the merits of the case, and presumably the court decision itself could be subject to various court appeals processes.   We need something similar for many of the dispute processes in the new gTLD program, and potentially other areas of ICANN decision making.    This is a key learning from the past two years of reconsideration cases.

Regards,
Bruce Tonkin