Summary heading

Series descriptive note

Function and purpose

This series consists of Cabinet Minutes (Decisions) received in Cabinet Office during the term of the First, Second, Third and Fourth Hawke Ministries from 11 March 1983 to 20 December 1991.  That is to say, the series includes all decisions accumulated during the Hawke administration.  The Australian Labour Party (ALP), led by Robert (Bob) Hawke, won the double dissolution election of 5 March 1983 with a substantial majority (with 75 members elected to the House of Representatives ), forming a caretaker government from 5 March 1983 until the First Ministry, Australia’s fifty-fifth, was sworn in on 11 March 1983 .  Hawke led the ALP to three further election wins, on 1 December 1984, on 11 July 1987 (double dissolution) and on 24 March 1990 before Paul Keating became Prime Minister in 1991.

A Cabinet Decision, traditionally called a ‘Cabinet Minute’, and referred to as such in the Cabinet Handbook published in 1986 and again in 1991, is the essential record output of the Cabinet system.  It is the fiat that authorises the bureaucracy to act in matters of significance – high level policy issues, major expenditure or significant appointments.  All matters discussed in a Cabinet meeting result in a Cabinet Minute (even if the decision is merely that the matter was noted).  The matters discussed are normally the formal Submissions received from ministers and departments which are listed in the agenda, prepared by Cabinet Office for that meeting.  However, a minister may, by prior agreement of the Prime Minister, bring up another matter for discussion for which no formal Submission has been made.  These are known as ‘under-the-line’ matters and the Minute resulting from the discussion is termed a Decision without Submission.

Senior officers of the Cabinet Office attend the Cabinet meetings to take notes of the discussion and the Decisions made (the notebooks created by the notetakers are described in RecordSearch as CRS A11099).  In the Fraser government, an additional facilitative record was introduced from 1976 called ’Debrief sheets’ – see CRS A12937.  Immediately after the conclusion of the Cabinet meetings, the Minutes are typed up from the notes and registered in the Cabinet Office and distributed to ministers and departments for action, as required.  Note that while Submissions are formulated by ministers and their departments, the Minutes are created in the Cabinet Office.  To assist the Cabinet officer in this regard, the Cabinet Handbook stipulates that a Submission must contain a recommendation and the wording of the recommendation should anticipate the wording of the Minute.  Each minute is created as a discrete document, traditionally called a ’Cabinet Minute’, normally of only one or two pages.  Multiple copies are created for distribution to ministers and departments for action as required, and within Cabinet Office, one copy is filed in a master set of Minutes contained in a sequence of folders that constitutes this series.  Another copy is filed with the relevant Submission in the Master set of Submissions (CRS A13977 and CRS A14039) and one is filed on the relevant Subject or CA file in CRS A11116.

This series consists of a total accumulation of 56 folders or volumes containing copies of all Decisions/Minutes made at Cabinet and Cabinet committee meetings during the term of the First, Second, Third and Fourth Hawke Ministries, filed in sequence by the Minute number.  The first folder of Minutes was begun on 11 March 1983 and the last folder was added to the series on 19 November 1991 and its contents end with Minute No 16171/LEG made at a meeting of the Legislative Committee on 18 December 1991.  This was the date of the last Cabinet or Cabinet committee meeting before the successful leadership challenge that brought the Hawke administration to an end.

Decisions/Minutes

As explained, the Hawke Government, until early 1985, continued the Fraser Government’s revived practice of holding ministerial meetings where Decisions made were registered and controlled in the sequence of Cabinet Minutes, and were distinguished by addition of an ‘M’ suffix (sometimes shown in the Minutes register as ‘MIN’).  The first Decisions of the First Hawke Ministry were Ministerial Decisions (made at a meeting of the full ministry in March 1983).  Ministries were normally inaugurated with a ministerial meeting of this kind and a short sequence of ministerial minutes; hardly more than a re-iteration of the previous set of Ministerial minutes.  These were all confined to housekeeping and procedural matters, mostly concerning specifically the operation of the Cabinet system, and procedures of the Cabinet office (control and circulation of Submissions etc).

It was normal procedure at Cabinet meetings for a senior officer of the Cabinet Office to take notes of the discussion and the Decisions made.  Immediately after the conclusion of the meeting, the formal Minutes were written up from these notes, typed and registered in the Cabinet Office and distributed to Ministers and departments for action, as required.  As indicated, the notebooks created by the notetakers are described in RecordSearch as CRS A11099.  In the Fraser Government, an additional facilitative record was introduced from 1976 called ’Debrief sheets’ – see CRS A12937.  These debriefs for the Hawke administration can be found in CRS A14045 (early debriefs) and CRS A14046.

Under-the-line Submissions - Memoranda

It was not uncommon for ministers to introduce a matter at Cabinet meetings, with the prior consent of the Prime Minister, for which no formal Submission had been made.  These were termed ‘under the line’ matters and resulted in a Decision Without Submission.  Such proposals were identified as ‘Cabinet Papers’ in the early days of the Fraser regime but were replaced by Cabinet Memoranda from February 1979.  Because Memoranda could be anticipated, like Submissions, the same requirements that applied to Submissions were gradually applied to Memoranda so that in time the distinction between an initial Submission and subsequent supporting Memoranda became less apparent.  Memoranda continued to be a feature of ministerial policy machinations throughout the Hawke administration.

With the advent of the ‘mega-departments’ in 1987, Cabinet agenda contained only up to ten items and senior ministers were able to concentrate their focus on political matters of the highest importance.  Changes to the way in which ‘under-the-line’ Submissions were dealt with meant that ministers knew which items were being brought to Cabinet.  By 1988, the Cabinet Office had developed the practice of circulating in advance a list of items that were to be discussed ‘under-the-line’.  It came to pass that ‘under-the-line’ matters were dealt with following formal business, ensuring that formal Submissions were discussed first.  The consent of the Prime Minister had been required during the Fraser administration to introduce meetings to discuss ‘under-the-line’ Submissions.

The inner Cabinet and the emergence of mega-departments

A major change introduced by the Labour government was to create an inner Cabinet as ‘a division of ministers was (..) essential for effective decision-making’  . Cabinet was felt to be unwieldy so an inner Cabinet was endorsed at the first meeting of Caucus.  The separation of the Cabinet and the Ministry in 1983 left some ministers feeling omitted from the formal decision-making process as there was no need to co-opt ministers involved in the formulation of the original recommendation to Cabinet where items were reconsidered by Cabinet.  Only seven full meetings of the full Ministry were held between July 1983 and June 1984.  The Whitlam government had adopted the practice of including the entire Ministry in the Cabinet and this practice was effectively continued in the caretaker Fraser Government, and in the early days of the Hawke administration that followed.  The Hawke Government released a policy paper entitled Reforming the Australian Public Service in which it was declared that an annual ministerial meeting would be held in order to ‘review national prospects and government operations and priorities’.  Only two of these meetings appear to have been held, however: the first was in February 1984 and the second was in 1985.  The Record of Attendance (A14049) shows which ministers attended each meeting, including co-opted ministers.  A minister who was not a Cabinet member might be co-opted to a meeting if the subject matter impacted significantly on his portfolio.  That is, he/she was advised by Cabinet Office of the Submission and the forthcoming meeting and was required to attend.  If the matter was Without Submission, the minister could attend if he/she chose.  As there was no set order in which matters listed were dealt with, a co-opted minister normally attended the whole meeting and might be invited to comment on other matters apart from the one in relation to which he/she had been co-opted.  The same arrangements applied to Cabinet Committee meetings.

One of the themes running through the Cabinet Office’s correspondence during the Hawke administration is the general decline in number of Cabinet and Committee meetings, and the decrease in the number and frequency of Decisions and Minutes, especially from about 1986-1987.  One of the reasons for the decline in the number and frequency of Cabinet meetings was the change in the structure of the Cabinet in July 1987, resulting in the reduction in the number of departments, allowing for ‘mega-departments’ to emerge.  This is in sharp contrast to the great increase in the volume of Cabinet business that occurred in the early years of the Fraser Government; by 1979, for instance, it was assessed as a three-fold expansion on the business of the previous Coalition Government (see series descriptive note for CRS A10756).

The proliferation of 257 Committee meetings noted during 1983-1984 was largely the result of the nature of the government of the day in which each Minister was allocated a department, creating many divergent opinions.  The unwieldy nature of the administration meant that many matters were brought to Cabinet or decided at committee meetings where divisions of opinion could not otherwise be resolved.  Once the government was reduced to 16 departments in 1987, the process of Cabinet committees was streamlined and far fewer Submissions were brought to Cabinet, reducing agenda sizes considerably, and a reduction in the number of committee meetings and Cabinet decisions was observed.  Cabinet then came to include representation by a minister from each portfolio.  See End Note in the series descriptive notes for CRS A13978 for tables of meetings by series, year, type and incidence.

Standing committees, sub-committees and task forces

A Submission to Cabinet may be referred, at the discretion of the Prime Minister, to a Cabinet Committee for consideration rather than to the Cabinet itself.  In some cases, the Committee having discussed the matter may then refer a recommendation to a meeting of Cabinet for a decision.  In other cases, the Committee itself made the Decision.  The Minute number in respect of any Submission indicates where the Decision was made.  A Decision made by Cabinet has no alpha suffix to the Minute number.  A Decision made in a Cabinet Committee has an alpha suffix which indicates which committee presided.  Generally, decisions made in any ad hoc committee all have the same suffix (Ad Hoc) except for Decisions of the Budget Committee which was, in effect, a recurring ad hoc committee – its Decisions have a ‘B' suffix.

Co-ordinating committees

Given an inner Cabinet was created, no priorities and planning committee was required, leaving three co-ordinating committees whose discussions ranged across all government activities:

·         Parliamentary Business Committee

·         Expenditure Review Committee

·         Legislation Committee

Functional committees

The industry and infrastructure committee was split into two, leaving six functional committees:

·         Economic Policy

·         Industry

·         Infrastructure

·         Social Policy

·         Legal and Administrative

·         Defence and External Relations

The Infrastructure Committee was abolished after the 1984 election and the National and International Security and National Crimes Authority Committees were established.  In addition, a host of sub-committees were created during the Hawke regime, including, during the First Ministry, the Sub-Committee of Legal and Administrative Committee, Sub-Committee on Industry Restructuring; and in the Second Ministry, the Taxation Sub-Committee, Sub-Committee on ACT Self-Government, Sub-Committee on Commonwealth Statutory Authorities and Government Enterprises, Sub-Committee on Industrial Relations Aspects of Australia’s Export Industries, Sub-Committee on Maintenance, Sub-Committee on Longer Term Economic Growth, Sub-Committee on Trade Competitiveness, Sub-Committee on Family Assistance and the Sub-Committee on Economic Adjustment.

Ad hoc committees had been created in the Fraser administration to bypass standing committees.  This was not the case in the Hawke administration, with the Ad-Hoc Committee on RCSIA (Royal Commission on Australia’s Security and Intelligence Agencies) and the Ad-Hoc Committee on Nurse Education in the First Ministry, the Ad Hoc Committee on Tax in the Second Ministry and the Ad Hoc Committee in the Third Ministry being notable exceptions. 

Matters under discussion were broken up into those that were ‘politically significant’ and those that were routine.  Routine matters were sent to the General Administrative Committee while three standing committees, Parliamentary Business Committee, Expenditure Review Committee and the Legislation Committee, dealt with Submissions incorporating any portfolios.  Sensitive issues were covered by the Security Committee.  Three policy development committees were created: Public Service Reform Committee, Structural Adjustment Committee and the Social and Family Policy Committee.  These committees were established to address the particularly difficult areas of public service reform, structural adjustment and social and family policy.  Matters were considered by the relevant functional committee before any business reached Cabinet.  Recommendations made by the committees were referred to as ‘blue papers’ while the final endorsement was referred to as a ‘white paper’.  Cabinet generally accepted the majority committee recommendations.  Submissions were often contested so committees tended to act as ‘a clearing house for cabinet and as an information exchange’. 

The following committees and sub-committees were active in the Hawke administration.  The lists are by Ministry and include each Committee or Sub-Committee once only.  In addition, approximate dates of the Committees' first appearance in Submissions recorded in this series, in approximate chronological order, are included.  Note the alpha suffix used to represent which committee presided has been included:

First Ministry

Ministry Committee, March 1983 (M)

Economic Policy Committee, March 1983 (EC)

Legal and Administrative Committee, March 1983 (LA)

Defence and External Relations Committee, March 1983 (DER)

Social Policy Committee, March 1983 (SP)

Infrastructure Committee, March 1983 (INF)

Industry Committee, March 1983 (IND)

Parliamentary Business Committee, March 1983 (PB)

Committee on Tax Avoidance Issues, April 1983 (TAX)

Expenditure Review Committee, April 1983 (ER)

Legislation Committee, April 1983 (LEG)

National and International Security Committee, April 1983 (NIS)

Committee on Social Security Computer, May 1983 (SSC)

Committee on Pecuniary Interests, March 1983 (Ad Hoc)

Economic Policy/Industry Committee, May 1983 (EP)

Committee on South-West Tasmania, May 1983 (Ad Hoc)

Revenue Committee, July 1983 (REV)

Committee on Government Purchasing, August 1983 (Ad Hoc)

Committee on Fuel Excise, August 1983 (Ad Hoc)

Sub-Committee of Legal and Administrative Committee, November 1983 (LA)

Sub-Committee on Industry Restructuring, May 1984 (IR)

Ad-Hoc Committee on RCSIA (Royal Commission on Australia’s Security and Intelligence Agencies), June 1984 (Ad Hoc)

Ad-Hoc Committee on Nurse Education, August 1984 (Ad Hoc)

National Crime Authority Sub-Committee, December 1984 (NCA)

International and Defence Committee, December 1984 (ID)

Second Ministry

Security Committee, January 1985 (SEC)

Taxation Sub-Committee, July 1985 (TSC)

Budget Committee, August 1985 (B)

Augmented Expenditure Review Committee, October 1985 (AER)

Sub-Committee on ACT Self-Government, November 1985 (ACT)

Sub-Committee on Commonwealth Statutory Authorities and Government Enterprises, November 1985 (SA)

Sub-Committee on Industrial Relations Aspects of Australia’s Export Industries, February 1986 (IRX)

National Crime Authority Committee, March 1986 (NCA)

Sub-Committee on Maintenance, March 1986 (SCM)

Sub-Committee on Longer Term Economic Growth, April 1986 (LTG)

Sub-Committee on Economic Adjustment, May 1986 (Ad Hoc)

Ministerial Task Force on Youth Allowances Revenue Committee, July 1986 (TYA)

Sub-Committee on Trade Competitiveness, October 1986 (TC)

Sub-Committee on Family Assistance, April 1987 (FA)

Secretaries Committee on Security and Intelligence (SCIS)

Third Ministry

Public Service Reform Commission, August 1987 (PSR)

Structural Adjustment Committee, August 1987 (SA)

General Administrative Committee, August 1987 (GA)

Social and Family Policy Committee, September 1987 (SFP)

Ad Hoc Committee, July 1989 (AH)

Fourth Ministry

Sub-Committee on Sustainable Development, July 1990 (SD)

Social Justice Committee, August 1990 (SJ)

Towards the end of the Hawke regime, Cabinet was preoccupied with considering the creation of further committees, namely, a skills, education, science and technology (SEST) committee, especially in support of the 'clever country' ideal and law enforcement and law enforcement policy and resources committees, especially in consideration of arms seizures, fraud control and access to tax information matters.  The latter two committees did not eventuate on the basis that it was felt that the existing Cabinet structure was adequate to meet any requirements.  For instance, major law enforcement issues would continue to be dealt with by Cabinet, including National Crime Authority matters, while less sensitive issues would go to the General Administrative Committee. 

Other matters of note included plans to abolish the Public Service Reform Committee, as issues could be directed to the reworked Structural Adjustment Committee (reducing its membership and changing its focus) or to the General Administrative Committee.  See item CA61 PART 4 from CRS A11116.

Related legislation

Using the series

All the Decisions (Minutes) of the First, Second, Third and Fourth Hawke Ministries are present in this series, whether they were made at a Cabinet, Committee or Ministerial meeting and whether they were made in regard to a Submission, a Memorandum or were Without Submission.  However, only those Decisions without Submission have been individually described in the item database of RecordSearch.  The folders are entered as standard item entries and the Decisions (Minutes) (within the folders) that are Without Submission are entered as sub-items of the entry for the folder.  Entries are made in this way because this series may be the only place where Decisions Without Submissions can be seen.  In all other cases (that is, where Decisions were made in response to a Submission), a copy of the Minute is present in the Submission series CRS A13977, all items of which have been individually entered in RecordSearch.  A subject keyword search in RecordSearch will therefore find any Minute on a particular subject, in series CRS A13977, if the Minute related to a Submission, or in series CRS A13979, if there was no Submission. Note that a new series, CRS 14039, was created by the agency to control both Submissions and Memoranda, as these were brought together into one series from December 1984, towards the end of the First Ministry.

Note also that in some cases, a Decision may be Without Submission, but a Memorandum may have been submitted in lieu of a formal Submission and in those instances, a copy of the Minute will be present with the Memoranda series CRS A13978 or CRS A14039.

The Register of Minutes (not in the custody of the Archives) shows the relevant CA file for each minute (that is, including Decisions without Submissions).

Note that there is no correlation between a Memorandum or Submission number and the Minute number for that Memorandum or Submission.  The sequence of Memorandum or Submission numbers reflects the chronology of the Memoranda or Submissions received in the Cabinet Office.  The sequence of Minute numbers reflects the chronology of the Memoranda or Submissions presented to a Cabinet meeting for consideration, and there are many variable factors that intervene to affect the latter.  In addition, the sequence of Minute numbers includes Decisions on matters for which no Submission was made (Decisions without Submissions).  The Minute number is therefore normally well in advance (in numerical terms) of the Submission number.  In the course of the First to the Fourth Hawke Ministries, there were up to 16,171 Minutes, and 8,525 Submissions and Memoranda generated by the administration.

See 'System of arrangement and control' in the series descriptive note for CRS A14039 for information regarding any RecordSearch entries in this series with titles commencing 'Reference copy of'.

Language of material

Physical characteristics

The Minutes are created in the Cabinet Office in a standardised format.  The aim is a succinct expression of the Cabinet’s will and a Minute is normally only one or two pages, though occasionally more where the matter is complex.  In addition, a schedule is sometimes attached.  The front page is headed ‘Cabinet Minute’ and has a copy number in the top-right hand corner.  The name of the meeting (whether Cabinet or a particular committee) and the place and date of the meeting are entered under the ‘Cabinet Minute’ heading, followed by the Minute number.  Underneath the Minute number is a brief description of the Submission or Memorandum that relates to the Minute, or an indication that the Minute is ‘without Submission’ or is a Memorandum involving a legislation matter, usually written as ‘Memorandum LEG’ including the alphabetical suffix used to describe the committee involved.  The text of the Minute then follows and at the end is the signature of the Committee Secretary.  Multiple copies are created.  The practice of the Cabinet Office is that master copies of all Minutes are accumulated in a sequence of folders arranged by the Minute number.  This series consists of a total of 56 folders.  The range of Minutes in each folder appears on a blue label on the spine of the folder.

System of arrangement and control

The items of this series are both the folders that are controlled by a simple number sequence, and the Minutes from Number 1 to Number 16171/LEG.  The numbers of the Minutes contained in the folders are allocated from the Minutes Register, not in the custody of the Archives.  The Minute number sequence is a simple number sequence ranging from 1 to 16171.  In some cases, however, where the Decision was made by a Cabinet Committee rather than the Cabinet itself, an alpha suffix is added to the Decision number which indicates which Committee made the Decision (see list of committees and suffixes above).

Note that this series includes some gaps in the Minute numbers.  This is largely the result of the omission of the Decisions without Submissions from the series (given these are included in the Submissions series CRS A13977 (First Ministry) and CRS A14039 (Second to Fourth Ministries).  There is currently no Register of Minutes (for the Second to Fourth Ministries) in the custody of the Archives.  Registers generally explain why a number is missing in each case. In some cases, numbers were simply not used by the Cabinet Office.  In other cases, some Minutes were removed from the folders and copies can sometimes be found in the relevant CA files.  Note that a large proportion of Memoranda (and some Submissions and Minutes), especially from 1985 onwards, were not transferred into the Archives in the main series ie CRS A14039 and CRS A13979.  Copies of most of the missing items have been made by the Archives and have been placed in the main series.  A single sheet of paper with the CA file reference has generally been provided by the Cabinet Office.  These remain with the copy items in the main series.

For items that were missing from the folders in this series upon transfer to the Archives, all copy items that were created from copies found by Archives' staff in CA files (A11116), item titles on RecordSearch commence with 'Reference copy of'.  For more detailed information, please see series descriptive note, under 'System of arrangement and control', for CRS A14039.

Relationships with other records

The Submission numbers are allocated from the Submissions register (CRS A13982) which documents the receipt in the Cabinet Office of all Submissions made during the ministry.  The relevant file in the CA series (CRS A11116) documents the process of preparation of the Submission for presentation to the Cabinet - see, for example, CA61 Part 2 from CRS A11116.  The Decisions (Minutes) register (CRS A13983) controls the allocation of Minute numbers to register all decisions made in that ministry, including Decisions without Submissions.  The Minutes themselves (normally one page for each Minute) are accumulated in this series (ie CRS A13979).  Cabinet Papers (CRS A12933), introduced from 1976, and Cabinet Memoranda (CRSA12930), introduced from 1979, are series of documents which substitute for or supplement Submissions.  The Attendance Sheets (CRS A14049) record which ministers were present at each meeting (as well as the type of meeting, whether Cabinet or a committee, and who were the notetakers at each meeting).

Finding aids

This series and related series of the First (Second, Third and Fourth) Hawke Ministry are described in the RecordSearch database both at series level and item level.  For general information regarding the Cabinet Office, refer to registration for agency CA 1472 in RecordSearch.  The Cabinet Handbook, first printed during the term of the Second Fraser Ministry (February, 1976), with updates published in 1983, 1998 and 1991, describes in detail the Cabinet Office procedures regarding the preparation of Submission the operation of the Cabinet system in broad terms.  The present edition (the seventh) can be seen at http:/www.dpmc.gov.au.

Note that Cabinet Decisions are generally referred to as ‘Minutes’ in the Cabinet Handbook.  Matters that are raised in the Cabinet meeting for which no Submission has been made (leading to a Decision without Submission) are referred to as ‘under–the-line’ matters.

Access conditions

Series history

Provenance

The records that constitute this series were created in the various government departments and registered as record items of this series in Cabinet Office (CA1472) between March 1983 and December 1991.

Immediate source of acquisition

Custodial history

The records that constitute this series were transferred from the Cabinet Office to the custody of the National Archives in May and July 2011.

Quantity in agency custody

Disposal history

Cabinet records fall into one of the pre-2000 disposal classes that, under Archives' transfer policy, may be transferred into Archives' custody.  The class that the records in this series were transferred into Archives' custody is RDA class 492/1.1.

Publication note

Additional information

End notes

Sources