Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Minister for the Cabinet Office, what his Department’s process is for (a) recording and (b) keeping minutes of all meetings relating to Government business.

Civil servants will make a judgment on what formal, structured meetings should be minuted, and what meetings should be recorded as having taken place, in light of the Civil Service Code, more specific best practice such as ‘Guidance on the management of Private Office Papers’, and the Cabinet Office guidance on Ministerial quarterly returns.

I note that there has been Parliamentary scrutiny of this issue in relation to the debate in this House on ‘Randox Covid Contracts’ of 17 November 2021. Following that debate, the Government has committed to publishing before Parliament a range of background papers relating to the Randox procurement.