Report of the Advisory Committee Consultations (ACOM), 20 September 2015

The ACOM Chair, Eskild Kirkegaard, opened the meeting by welcoming all partici-pants, a special welcome was made to Alexandra Silva, Portugal, and Nick Bailey, UK, who both attended an ACOM meeting for the first time. All participants presented themselves in a Tour de Table. The meeting was attended by 17 member countries (see list of participants in Annex 1).It was emphasized that the ACOM Consultation meeting is not an official meeting and therefore no decisions can be taken at the meeting. Those will be taken afterwards at the ACOM Forum and at the ACOM meeting in December.The meeting was updated on election of ACOM Vice-Chairs and Chairs that is usually an item for the Consultation meeting. The situation this year is that the contracts for all 3 Vice-Chairs are running out by the end of the year. According to current rules the term can be prolonged for one year. As Council is going to decide on a proposal to change the conditions and length of terms for Vice-Chairs in October there will be no election until Council had made a final decision. Currently John Simmonds has in-formed the Chair that he wish to end his term, so at least one new chair will be needed. Carmen Fernandez has not yet decided. Mark Tasker would like to stay on as Vice-Chair at least for one more year.