38 ways to the committees’ work. It should be noted that many of these roles increase members’ workload, including in between sessions. The main roles are: ✔✔ Chair – each treaty body has a Chair, generally elected by the membership for a two-year period (sometimes renewable) and generally on the basis of geographic rotation, although this is not always the case and not required by the treaties (members are independent and do not represent the States that nominated them). The Chair’s principal responsibility is to preside at public and private meetings of the treaty body. In addition, the Chair presides at the meetings of the bureau (see below). He or she encourages consensus within the treaty body when decisions are taken, protects the integrity of the treaty body and its membership and encourages members to be independent and impartial. In between sessions, the Chair may have to take decisions on urgent issues on behalf of the committee and is in constant contact with its secretary about organizational and other issues. The Chair attends the annual meeting of Chairpersons and addresses the General Assembly when presenting the committee’s annual or biennial report. Furthermore, as the General Assembly called for in its resolution 68/268, Chairs play a key role in formulating conclusions on issues related to working methods and procedural matters, promptly generalizing good practices and methodologies among all treaty bodies, and ensuring coherence across the treaty bodies by standardizing working methods (para. 38). ✔✔ Member of the bureau – most treaty bodies have a bureau, elected by members according to the treaty body’s rules of procedure. The bureau consists of the Chair and members who generally (but not always) represent the four regional groups (other than the regional group of the Chair). One of the bureau members serves as committee rapporteur (see below), while the remainder are Vice-Chairs, who replace the Chair in official functions in her or his absence. The bureau meets regularly during the session, usually outside official meeting hours, to discuss any matters related to the functioning of the treaty body. The bureau assists the Chair in making decisions and also undertakes preliminary discussion of issues facing the treaty body prior to discussion/decision in plenary. ✔✔ Rapporteur – the rapporteur is usually the member with the responsibility for drafting and presenting the session/annual/biennial reports. The secretariat assists the rapporteur in preparing the draft and the rapporteur presents a draft to the treaty body for consideration and adoption. Also, some rapporteurs are given the task of ensuring the coherence and