Cabinet meetings are convened and presided over by the Prime Minister or, in the absence of the Prime Minister, by the Minister appointed as the Acting Prime Minister.

Any Minister can request the Prime Minister to call a special meeting of the Cabinet to consider an urgent issue.

Cabinet agendas must be approved by the Prime Minister for circulation before Cabinet meetings. (In relation to Cabinet committees, the Chair of the committee approves agendas and papers for circulation.)

The Prime Minister has the authority, in the absence of the relevant Minister, to direct a Ministry, through the Secretary to the Cabinet, to submit a Cabinet paper where necessary.

If a Minister requests Cabinet discussion of a matter within another Minister’s area of responsibility, the matter should first be discussed with the responsible Minister and then approved by the Prime Minister with a direction as to which Ministry should submit the Cabinet paper.

A draft agenda for each normal weekly Cabinet meeting is prepared by the Secretary to the Cabinet, taking into account the Forward Program of Cabinet Business and the submissions that have already been received by the Cabinet Office, or are expected to be received by the Cabinet Office prior to the deadline for submissions in 7.1.

Submissions are not automatically listed on the agenda for the next Cabinet meeting, for example where more than one submission is being prepared on related subjects that should be considered together. The Prime Minister’s desire to make Cabinet meetings more strategic may lead to grouping a number of submissions on related subjects, based on the Forward Program of Cabinet Business compiled by the Cabinet Office using information provided by Ministries (see section 5.1).

Submissions may also be held over for a later meeting if significant technical issues have been raised by other Ministries or if not all relevant Ministries have been consulted. This is to ensure that, when it comes to consider a submission, Cabinet has all the relevant information on the table to make an informed decision and that any factual disputes have been resolved. (This does not, however, imply that disagreements between Ministries on policy issues or priorities need to be resolved before submissions are discussed. Resolving such issues is, after all, a major role of the Cabinet.)

Submissions received after the deadline and any submissions that fail to meet the requirements in this Manual will not be included on the agenda for the next meeting, unless approved by the Prime Minister because of the genuine urgency of the issue.

To assist the Prime Minister’s decisions on the agenda, the standard template for Cabinet Submissions requires Ministers to highlight the reasons for any urgency in making the decision and any related submissions being prepared (see section 5.2 and annex 1).

In general, the agenda for a regular Cabinet meeting shall include (in the following order):

1. Any issues to be raised by the Chair of the meeting;
2. Confirmation of draft conclusions from the previous Cabinet meeting;
3. Consideration of circulated submissions submitted by Ministers;
4. Reports on Ministers’ international travel or other significant events;
5. Reports on implementation of Cabinet decisions; and
6. Any other business (which is normally restricted to items for information only; proposals for Cabinet decision should be submitted as written submissions using the standard template).

This agenda order gives priority to substantial proposals on which Ministers have submitted written submissions and minimizes the time to be spent on reviewing the previous meeting or discussing issues not covered by submissions. As described in section 9.2, the Secretary to the Cabinet will have already circulated the draft conclusions from the previous Cabinet meeting.

After the agenda for a meeting is approved, the Secretary to the Cabinet shall circulate it to all members along with the papers relating to each item to be discussed. As noted in section 7.1, this should occur on Thursday for a Monday Cabinet meeting. As the e-Cabinet system is introduced, Ministers will be able access the Cabinet papers through the Government Electronic Filing System using the Government of Grenada Single Sign on from Office 365. Cabinet members will be advised by the Cabinet Office as further steps are taken to fully introduce the e-Cabinet system.  

After the agenda and related documents are finalized, no item can be added to the agenda without the approval of the Chair. All requests for late additions to the agenda must be submitted to the Prime Minister through the Secretary to the Cabinet.

A Minister who wishes to raise a matter orally in Cabinet, because of great urgency or particular confidentiality, should inform the Prime Minister as early as possible through the Secretary of the Cabinet. In this regard Ministers should note that Cabinet requires substantial policy issues and other complex recommendations to be put forward in a written submission using the template described in section 5.2 and attached in annex 1.

The Prime Minister may call an emergency meeting of the Cabinet at any time by informing the Secretary to the Cabinet. When an emergency Cabinet meeting is called, the Cabinet Office shall inform Cabinet members of the time, venue and agenda for the meeting as quickly as possible, by phone or text message. The agenda for emergency meetings will generally be restricted to major, urgent issues that cannot wait until the next regular Cabinet meeting. Normal Cabinet business is not usually included on the agenda for emergency meetings. See section 12.1 of this Manual for further information on the role of Cabinet during national emergencies.

The procedures in this section also apply to meetings of Cabinet committees (with references to the Prime Minister applying to the committee Chair).