The work however does not end there as the UK must finalise its view on other NBs’ comments too. As the JTC 1 Directives explicitly state, the reason why all NB comments are distributed is to allow all NBs to form an opinion on all of them:
> Upon receipt of the ballot results, and any comments, the SC Secretariat shall
> distribute this material to the SC NBs […] The NBs shall be requested to consider
> the comments and to form opinions on their acceptability. (13.6)
and Alex Brown urges NB to do their homework:
So, NBs need to do their homework so that delegations arriving at the BRM in Geneva are fully briefed. The delegation should ideally know their national position on all 1,000 or so distinct comment/responses that could be discussed. It is the responsibility of the delegation to faithfully represent their national position (not individual divergent delegate views), and to be prepared to respond to any fresh issues that arise in line with guidance their NB has given them.
It remains subject to further discussions if the procedures were made for 6000 pages specification with 2000 pages of dispositions. It is obvious that OOXML will get insufficient review before the BRM by national bodies. Alex Brown as an OOXML instructor, asks member states to do their homework while reports from national bodies evidence the opposite. Yet, the lack of transparency and international cooperation will lead to suboptimal work by the Committees, simply because no NB has the capacity to consider all proposals. It is the result for the permission to take the fast-track road for a giant and immature specification that was granted by a majority of NB. Now the NB have the duty to deliver.