How to upload and lodge papers in CabNet

The Cabinet paper workflow begins with the agency or Minister’s office uploading the final draft of a paper once a Minister has approved it.

All Cabinet and Cabinet committee papers with a security classification of In Confidence, Sensitive or Restricted should be uploaded into CabNet, once the owning Minister has given their approval. Cabinet papers should be lodged in CabNet by 10am on the Thursday before the meeting it is intended to be considered at.

CabNet requires users to nominate the type of paper being uploaded at the start of the upload process. The three types are General, Travel and Appointment. General papers are all papers that are not travel or appointment papers, and include policy and other legislative proposals.

CabNet also requires uploaders to specify whether a paper is being uploaded as a final draft or a paper for lodgement. Note that:

• Agencies can only upload final draft papers, which are then lodged by a Minister’s office.
• Minister’s offices can choose to either:
  • lodge a final draft uploaded by an agency (two-step process)
  • upload a final draft and then lodge it (two-step process)
  • skip straight to lodgement by selecting ‘paper for Lodgement’ (one-step process).

Below are checklists to help agencies upload final draft papers, and Minister’s offices to upload and lodge Cabinet papers. This information is taken from the agency and Minister’s office CabNet training guides.

For agencies: How to upload final draft papers#

The workflow on CabNet begins with an agency or Minister’s office uploading the Final Draft of a paper at the point that it is ready and has Ministerial approval. At the completion of the upload process the submission will have the status of ‘Final Draft’.

1. Navigate to the CabNet homepage
2. In the ‘Upload a Paper’ section of the homepage, click on the ‘General’ button under the heading ‘Final Draft’
3. Locate the submission document in your local or network drive
4. Click the ‘confirm’ button
5. Complete the ‘Submission information’:
   1. Owning portfolios/agencies. For:
      1. single portfolio/agency papers, complete the portfolio, owning Minister and agency fields. Ensure these are correct, as the selections provide for access to authorised users at the completion of the lodgement process
      2. multiple portfolio papers, add additional portfolios as appropriate. In the case of multiple agencies co-drafting a paper to a single Minister or single portfolio, use the ‘add portfolio’ button (circled above), to record all co-drafting agencies
   2. Contacts. In the contact name fields enter the names of the individuals that external parties (in other agencies or Ministers’ offices) should contact in the first instance if they have enquiries about the paper
   3. Security classifications. Follow this link for information about security classifications
   4. 'Limit access’. Leave blank. This function must only be used after discussion with the Cabinet Office or your Minister’s office. Information about using the ‘Limit access’ function is covered in the Limited Access Submissions topic. Follow this link for further information about limit access and other CabNet access information
6. Click the ‘Next’ button
7. Complete the ‘Intended meeting’ information
8. Click the ‘Next’ button
9. Complete the ‘Agency consultation’ information. Note that selection of agencies includes nominating the relevant Agency Portfolio Group (APG) within that agency. APGs reflect the individual portfolios that the agency supports. In cases where it is not clear which APG should be nominated as consulted contact the individual/s consulted within the agency in question to confirm with them the appropriate APG/s to select
10. Click the ‘Next’ button
11. At this point, you have the option to add an attachment. If you don’t have any attachments to upload, click the ‘Next’ button
12. The ‘Review’ screen below is displayed, and you now have the opportunity to check and update the information you have entered into CabNet.If the information is correct, you are ready to upload the submission
13. Click the ‘Upload Final Draft’ button at the bottom right of the screen
14. The paper has been successfully uploaded into CabNet. A message will be displayed on the submission preview.

Lodging a CabNet final draft submission checklist

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For Minister’s offices: How to lodge a final draft paper that has already been uploaded by an agency#

1. Before you start, check that:
   1. the Document is a Cabinet or Cabinet committee paper with a security classification of: In Confidence, Sensitive or Restricted
   2. the paper has already been uploaded to CabNet by the originating agency as a Final Draft
   3. the Minister has approved the paper to be lodged in CabNet (internal office processes apply for securing the Minister’s approval)
2. Select submission to lodge:
   1. navigate to the submission you want to lodge and click to select
   2. under ‘Submission actions’, click ‘Lodge’
3. Review  ‘Submission information’ sections previously completed by the originating agency and amend if necessary, in particular:
   1. is the ‘Title’ field correct? Does it match the title on the paper?
   2. is ‘Meeting’ type and ‘Intended meeting’ date correct?
4. Complete ‘Ministerial consultation’ section:
   1. include all relevant Ministers and their correct portfolios as CabNet provisions access to other Ministers and their Portfolio Groups based on this information
   2. record consultation with other parties
5. Review ‘Agency consultation’ section previously completed by the originating agency
6. Upload any attachments that may be required (likely to be unnecessary). Note that it is not possible to amend the title of an attachment during the lodgement process. If you want to change the title of an attachment, use the ‘Rename attachment’ function under ‘Submission actions’ once you have completed lodgement
7. Check and update (if necessary) the Submission Information displayed on the ‘Review’ screen
8. Click ‘Lodge’
9. Review uploaded Word documents on the individual preview screens in CabNet to check that formatting is correct. If there are any issues, liaise with the Cabinet Office. 

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For Minister’s offices: How to upload and lodge a paper#

1. Before you start, check that:
   1. the document is a Cabinet or Cabinet committee paper with a security classification of: In Confidence, Sensitive or Restricted
   2. the Minister has approved the paper to be lodged in CabNet (internal office processes apply for securing the Minister’s approval)
   3. an electronic version of the approved paper (Word) and any attachments (PDF preferred) is saved on your local or network drive
2. Upload paper:
   1. from the ‘Upload a Paper’ section on the homepage, click on the relevant paper type button under ‘Paper for Lodgement’.Do not select a paper type under ‘Upload Final Draft’ unless you specifically intend this
   2. browse to locate the submission document in your local or network drive, click ‘Confirm’
3. Complete ‘Submission information’ sections, ensuring in particular:
   1. is the auto-populated ‘Title’ field correct?Does it match the title on the paper? Amend if necessary
   2. click on ‘Add portfolio’ button if the paper is joint with another Minister/s
   3. is the ‘Meeting type’ and ’Intended meeting’ date correct?
4. Complete ‘Ministerial consultation’ section:
   1. include all relevant Ministers and their correct portfolios as CabNet provisions access to other Ministers and their Portfolio Groups based on this information
   2. record consultation with other parties
5. Complete ‘Agency consultation’ section:
   1. include all relevant agencies and their correct portfolios as CabNet provisions access to the Agency Portfolio Groups based on this information
   2. APH papers also require information on nominations sought from agencies
6. Complete ‘Attachment information’ section and upload attachment/s, if required:
   1. click ‘Upload new attachment’
   2. browse to locate the document in your local or network drive, click ‘confirm’
   3. complete all the ‘Attachment information’ fields, ensuring in particular:
      1. is the auto-populated ‘Title’ field correct?Does it match the title on the attachment? Amend if necessary
      2. add a number to the title (e.g. Appendix 1, Appendix 2) if there is more than one attachment to be uploaded
   4. Repeat the above process if there is another attachment
7. Check and update (if necessary) the Submission Information displayed on the ‘Review’ screen
8. Click ‘Lodge’
9. Review uploaded Word documents on the individual preview screens in CabNet to check that formatting is correct. If there are any issues, liaise with the Cabinet Office. 
10. If an Appointment paper, use ‘View and manage access’ function to manually add access to the owning agency, as the relevant agency will otherwise not have access.