Papers of the War Cabinet's Eastern Committee [‎53v] (106/544)

12
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The Committee decided:
To ay prove the action taken by the General Officer Com-
manding, Mesoyo turn ia.
Secretarial
Procedure.
5. Mr. Montagu said that he had a small point of procedure he
wished to raise in regard to the method of recording the Proceed
ings of the Committee. He thought that long-hand notes were
open to the objection that they could not record the whole of the
discussion; that certain important points, and occasionally the
sequence of an argument, must almost inevitably be missed under
such conditions, and that valuable time of members was taken up
in scrutinising and correcting draft Minutes. He thought, there- t
fore, that it might be preferable either to have the Minutes
recorded in shorthand, or that the decisions only, and not the dis
cussions, should be recorded. He had raised the same point at a
recent Meeting of the Economic Defence and Development Com
mittee, who had decided in favour of recording decisions only. He
understood that this procedure was now adopted in the case of the
Proceedings of the War Cabinet.
The Chairman explained that:
(a.) The procedure followed by the Eastern Committee was
identical with that obtaining in the case of the War
Cabinet, with this exception, that opinions expressed
by members of the War Cabinet were not, in the
ordinary course, attributed to those members by name,
as the Cabinet was a corporate body, with, presumably,
one opinion only, but that statements made by ministers
and others attending the War Cabinet meetings, and
even sometimes by War Cabinet Ministers themselves,
were recorded against their own names.
(b.) The Minutes constituted a running record of events in
the Middle East, and this record was found useful by
many who were not members of the Committee, e.g.,
Mr. Chamberlain had asked to be supplied with draft
Minutes, in addition to the printed copies he received
as a member of the Cabinet, as he found them valuable
in assisting him to follow the trend of events, which it
was difficult to pursue if he had only the very varied,
daily telegrams to turn to. Further, the Secretary of
State for War had asked Colonel Amery to obtain
special copies of the Minutes, in order to keep Lord
Milner au courant with what was happening in the %
Middle East. Moreover, he (the Chairman) was
informed that the British Section of the Supreme War
Council had recently asked for copies of the Minutes,
in order that they 'might thereby follow the current
of events and our policy and activities in the areas
which came within the Committee's scope.
(c.) He had had an opportunity of discussing that morning
with Mr. Chamberlain, tiie procedure of the two Com
mittees of which they were the respective Chairmen,
and Mr. Chamberlain had agreed that the conditions
were such as to render a different procedure desirable
in each case.
(d.) The alternative that shorthand notes should be taken
was open to the following opjections:
(1.) Shorthand notes, he was informed, taken of the
Proceedings of the Imperial War Cabinet, had
resulted in very extensive corrections being made.