Hello Everyone
Please take the time to read the new RPRA Rule 241 very carefully and with a legal mind.
"The positioning of the ETS sensors/antennae will not be allowed on any landing boards or other external surface in a position where the electronic ring can trigger the sensors before the bird is confined within the loft or trap.
Club Officials may make random checks at any time.
Contravention of this rule will result in disciplinary action under Rule 70a."
A rule can only be enforced using the words that are actually there, not by those implied or wished for.
(1). On a technicality, the ring does not trigger the sensors as stated in the rule.
When switched on, the electro-magnetic fields within the antenna pad are constantly scanning, and when a field detects a transponder (the electronic ring) it is then recorded. So whether the technical terminology in the rule is correct is open to question.
(2). The rule does not state where the antenna pad can be situated, only where it can’t be situated.
The rule states that it “.. will not be allowed on any landing board or other external surface ...†– therefore by implication this means that the landing board referred to is an external landing board (and not an internal landing board such as a corridor floor).
The reference to the bird being confined, is only is relation to when the antenna is in a position where the bird can’t be timed, ie. on the (external) landing board or other external surface.
At no point does the new rule state that the bird must be confined when the antenna is in a position that is allowed. Therefore birds can be timed anywhere (including the loft corridor) without being confined, except in those positions expressly excluded by the new rule.
(3). The new rule states that the “ .. antennae will not be allowed on any landing board or other external surface ...†therefore an antenna placed UNDER a landing board will be OK !!!
It could therefore be argued that nothing has significantly changed, except that the new rule has muddied the water considerably more. The old RPRA rule 241 was perfectly adequate, except for the confusion of some between the meaning of confines and confined. A return to the old rule would be preferable as there is more than enough ambiguity with this new rule.
