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[Stewart Reuben]

There is or was a feature in the FIDE laws that allows local variations - this was used to permit re-pairing after one hour in FIDE rated British events. In the event of the Kirsan rule change, what happens if a federation or an organiser decides to reinstate one hour defaults as a local variation? Would FIDE play hard-ball and deny rating services and title chances?

If Kirsan's rule change is agreed, then a local variation would not be allowed according to the Laws of Chess. It would have the same effect as playing with the kings and queens set up so that they did not face each other. Thus the games should not be FIDE Rated.

That is why it is so important that your private views be sent to FIDE. Geurt Gijssen has told me that FIDE have received a large number of comments, particularly from the UK.

Of course, the arbiter might lie and send in the results for rating anyway. This is what the US do. But how can it be good for chess if the arbiters are encouraged to be deceitful?

Examples of the arbiter's or rules of the competition discretion include:
The Preface, 6.4, 6.6, 6.7, 6.8d, 6.13c, 6.13d, 6.14, 7.2, 7.3, 8.1, 8.5a, 8.7, 10.2, 11, 12.2b, 12.5, 12.8, 13.4, 13.5, 13.7b, A8, A10, A11, A12, D. I have not looked at the new Laws for this as they are deliberately not available to anybody except Geurt and me, at least until we send them off to the Presidential Board, hopefully tomorrow.
26 in all and I may have missed some. I have not taken any from F, where there is clearly overall discretion, but never actually stated.
I did ask whether there should be an Article about the Arbiter not bringing the game into disrepute, but this seems so obvious, it does not require codification.
Stewart Reuben