A Cabinet agenda is generated on the basis of items listed against the meeting event in CabNet.
Items are listed against a meeting event in CabNet as a result of Ministers’ offices and agencies nominating a meeting for the consideration of their Minister’s submission. The Cabinet Office can also add meeting items into CabNet in instances where there is no paper uploaded in CabNet.
Ministers’ must request approval to submit a paper direct to Cabinet or to raise an oral item at Cabinet. Travel papers can be submitted direct to Cabinet once approval in principal for the travel has been obtained from the Prime Minister.
During the week leading up to a Cabinet meeting the agenda for the meeting is prepared by the Cabinet Office.
Each agenda in CabNet moves through three states:
- draft agenda – a first draft of meeting items, subject to change, and accessible by Cabinet Office CabNet users only
- published draft agenda – draft of meetings items, subject to change, and accessible by Cabinet Office, Prime Minister’s Office and Policy Advisory Group CabNet users only
- final agenda – a confirmed list of meeting items, accessible by the above CabNet users, and Cabinet Ministers only.
Ministers outside Cabinet and agency users cannot access the Cabinet Agenda in CabNet. However, a CabNet user can view individual items in the Cabinet meeting view screen if that user has access to the item (e.g. owning Ministers and agencies, in addition to consulted Ministers/agencies and informed agencies).
Types of items listed on the Cabinet agenda#
The Cabinet agenda usually includes the following types of items:
- submissions (content accessible in CabNet via the submission preview by authorised users):
- papers approved for submission direct to Cabinet
- papers referred from Committees
- travel reports and proposed travel papers
- reports of committees (content accessible in CabNet by authorised users)
- reference to highly classified items (submissions that are classified Confidential or above will not be on CabNet and will be distributed in hard copy. CabNet will display such items as “Non-CabNet items” with relevant reference information only).
Oral items may also be raised at Cabinet with the agreement of the Prime Minister.
A corresponding minute, or several minutes, may be issued as a result of consideration of any of the above types of items including any oral items, subject to the decisions made and the security classification and endorsement/s of the individual item.