PeterAlan

femmwench (et al), I completely understand your horrified reaction. Cyberyeti can speak for himself, but giving him the benefit of the doubt I had read it as no more than a clumsily-worded attempt to pose an entirely hypothetical scenario, by way of introducing the question that followed; ie as:

On this detail, Felicity, I'm sure that the EBU does not intend to involve itself in "clarify[ing] to what degree that person is transgender", as you'll see from the policy I linked above.

I don't know whether it has anything to do with the reason for this, but a national RA has the advantage of working within a single national legal framework and culture.

EBU has a policy document, here.

CY, I've always appreciated your contributions to the whole range of forums here, but for me this sub-thread has gone on long enough. My feeling is that it's becoming more and more about your own prejudices concerning The Guardian, which seem to me to be more evident than the paper's alleged issues, and I don't expect to contribute further to it.

Both articles make clear that this has been done in the past, but not in the period immediately before the election, which apparently was the basis for the objection. I don't think that a comparison of the articles supports your contention that the Guardian is trying to hide anything:

This still reads to me as a bunch of assertions without any real evidence being adduced. I think that you need much firmer ground before accusing reputable journalists of making up stories. I too am a homeless centrist (and much more Radio 4 than Radio 5), but the main difference between us, I suspect, is that I am firmly pro-remain whereas I have the strong impression that you are not. You suggest that I haven't "really read it [The Guardian] much"; in fact, I read the online edition most days, and buy the paper edition from time to time, as I do The Times. I thought that the The Times' relatively balanced pro-remain stance on Brexit was appropriate pre-referendum; since then, it seems to me to have trimmed somewhat and editorially to be insufficiently critical of the various positions that both the successive governments and the opposition have put forward.

Evidence, please, in particular of your "made stuff up" assertion.

I think you have to be reading it with very blue-lensed glasses to come to this conclusion. Yes, The Guardian's centre-left-leaning and pro-remain, but to describe it as a "propaganda organ" is a massive overbid. Propaganda is the Mail's front page banner headline labelling pictured Supreme Court judges as "Enemies Of The People": the Guardian does not resort to this sort of trash journalism. The Guardian and the Mirror provide some counterweight to the generally right-to-very-right-wing, heavily pro-leave press (Telegraph, Express, Mail, Sun), but the overall result is nevertheless far from balanced.

As has already been noted, a premature play from dummy (or any other hand for that matter) is a breach of Law 44B, so by definition is an infraction.

I agree that ChCh does not have the right to change RR's played card, but it seems to me that that card was the "low card" RR had earlier called for, provided that the manner of his calling for it (which is not totally clear from the OP) was sufficient to establish it as 'played' under the provisions of Laws 45 & 46. Guardian Angel again?

And I suggest again that you re-read what I wrote, or maybe read it fully for the first time. What I was referring to was a putative defender correcting their own misexplanation, not partner's, which I mentioned in an earlier post: I don't suppose that either of us wants to pursue this line any further, but I will be busy this weekend and not adding to this thread.

And there's also still the opportunity for opening leader's partner to summon the TD in order to correct an earlier misexplanation of theirs, but I wasn't looking to list every detail.

This is welcome. As is your acceptance that the use of "insta-facing" is not, after all, "complete drivel". He could well have wanted to ask what a double by E of the splinter bid would have meant (and I realise that it had not been explained as such during the auction). Yes, he can ask this later, but (where the RA follows the default face-down procedure) as I and others have said it's not for the opening leader to over-ride, in breach of Law 74A3, rights that declarer or leader's partner have under the procedures of Law 41B, which we are both taking as "written correctly".

... and also before CC could have exercised his right to ask his own questions. Such action qualifies as "insta-facing" in my book. By the way, you will see (if you read it more carefully) that my earlier post related solely to how certain actions might be viewed as relating to the laws, and did not include any reference to any persons, fictional or otherwise; I find it difficult to see how you find any animus to any such person in what I said.

Whilst declarer can ask questions after the opening lead is faced and dummy displayed, nevertheless Law 41B says: Note in particular the use of "Before". Whilst it is unusual in club bridge for a declarer to ask questions before the lead is faced and dummy tabled, he / she has that right which should not be pre-empted. It is also possible for a putative defender to realise that a prior explanation of his / hers was "erroneous or incomplete" [Law 20F4(a)] in which case he /she "must summon the Director before the end of the Clarification Period and correct the misexplanation." Such a realisation might be triggered by a question from the putative declarer whilst the opening lead is still face-down and thus before the end of the Clarification Period. I submit that insta-facing of the opening lead does not permit these proper processes, and is therefore indeed an infraction as a violation of correct procedure [Law 74A3].

You sound like the Daily Express. Do you have any evidence whatsoever for these sweeping assertions?

There is no universal answer to this. Look first at the league's rules / conditions of contest. And tell us the jurisdiction.

I hope you wouldn't rule -1, since it's either making or -2 (W has a long ♣ as well as the 10). That change of wording wouldn't change my view of this particular case in your and my [EBU] jurisdiction, unless EBU's guidance changed in a way that clearly made it necessary. Remember, it's not really that declarer can be thinking that his ♣s must be running through length, and will wake up to E showing out: he must be thinking that ♣8 is winning by force. What reason do you have for thinking that declarer would depart from the line of his claim statement? That's a real overbid in this case: as has been made clear, declarer's claim statement ignores several realities that he should be aware of, and it's hardly unreasonable to hold him to it. As soon as he loses the ♣8 he's -2, and I haven't seen anyone 'concocting' any other 'unlikely play' to increase the damage. I think this would be a mistake: it's tantamount to deciding on an a priori probability that the player would have independently woken up to the deficiencies in a claim statement had the hand been played out, and I prefer the current single choice based on the requisite balance of the circumstances in each case. In virtually every contentious contested claim the contest is only over whether the player would or would not have done some specific thing at a particular point, and is a purely binary decision; this is not the general position in other judgment cases to which weighted scores apply, when there are frequently several possible outcomes to be considered and assessed.

Of course it's equitable: we have a declarer who's careless enough not to realise (or at least to mention) that all his ♦s are good, and instead bases a claim on making all 4 further ♣ tricks when they don't all cash, presumably because he's also careless enough not to realise that the ♣10 is still out. It must be a 'doubtful point' that he would wake up to that latter point, and I see no conflict with the law in resolving it against him.

The EBU White Book gives the following guidance: [Edit: I see that Tramticket has already posted the last paragraph above.] In this case, declarer finds that the presumed ♣8 'winner' is not in fact winning when W takes ♣10 and, presumably, another, so the result on the basis of the last paragraph would be -2.

If (as here) in the same suit by the same player (Law 64 B 2).

The second part of this statement does not follow from the first unless the quota has actually been determined in terms of and by "the impact on resources and existing residents". That has not been the recent case in the UK; instead, the nearest thing we have had to an immigration quota ("net (im)migration in the tens of thousands") was arrived at in a totally arbitrary and unstructured fashion, based, it would appear, solely on political perceptions of what would play best with certain sections of the press.

The Dukedom of Orléans (Wikipedia again) was a particular title derived from the immediate younger brother of the king, and the holders had ducal numbers I, II etc to distinguish those of the same name. Louis Philippe II's father was the first Louis Philippe, Duc d'Orléans, and on succession in 1793 his (Louis Philippe II's) son indeed became Louis Philippe III, Duke of Orléans. However, in 1830 he (the son) became King of the French, took the title of Louis Philippe I in that capacity, and ceased to be the Duke of Orléans. He abdicated in 1848, and died in exile in England in 1850.

Yes. Wikipedia will tell you more about this than you want to know.