Given the potential implications of many proposals for other Ministries and sectors, all Cabinet submissions that involve complex policy proposals should be circulated in draft form to affected Ministries and the Cabinet Office before finalization and submission for Cabinet. This consultation process should be arranged through the respective Cabinet Liaison Officers.

Circulation of the draft submission to other relevant Ministries should take place prior to finalizing it with the Minister’s signature. The submission template (Annex 1) requires the originating Ministry to list the other Ministries consulted and to summarize whether each consulted Ministry supports the recommendations, with short written comments from other Ministries included in an attachment to the submission where they oppose the recommendations or where significant issues are raised.

The Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Legal Affairs and the Department of Public Administration shall review the financial, legal and human resource implications of draft proposals, respectively, before a submission is formally submitted and circulated. And any other Ministry likely to be affected by a proposal must also be consulted before a submission is finalized and submitted.

It is not enough to simply list Ministries and agencies with whom the proposal has been discussed. The originating Ministry must circulate the draft submission to relevant Ministries and agencies and provide sufficient opportunity for them to comment on the likely impact of the proposal on their operations or on their sector. Specific views of other Ministries must be recorded, including whether those Ministries agreed with the recommendations in the submission.

Many proposed policies, especially those focused on economic and social development, require a ‘whole of government’ approach, either at a policy level or in implementation, or both. For example, a school nutrition policy requires cooperation between education and health authorities. More broadly, development of Grenada’s marine resources requires coordination of fisheries, tourism and transport policies, as well as appropriate investment incentives, management of runoff from land-based agriculture that may affect reefs and the development of human capital to make the most of the countries natural resources.

There are often technical or operational issues affecting another Ministry’s programs or sector where the relevant Minister may not be sufficiently aware of the details to raise them in the Cabinet discussion. Circulation of draft submissions provides greater opportunity for Ministers to be briefed by their Ministries on the potential policy, technical or operational implications of another Ministry’s proposal before the Cabinet discussion.

Consultation between relevant Ministries before a submission is signed by the Minister and submitted to Cabinet also provides an opportunity to settle any factual disagreements between Ministries before the proposal is circulated to the Cabinet members. Cabinet decision-making is an ideal mechanism to expose and resolve issues of policy and priority, but it is not so well-suited to resolve differences between Ministries on factual or technical issues.

Given that the major purpose of this consultation is to iron out technical and operational issues affecting other Ministries and to resolve any factual disagreements between Ministries before the submission is circulated to the Cabinet, it is not essential that other Ministers are personally involved in this consultation process. However, all comments provided by Ministries should be recorded whether they are provided on the authority of the Minister or on the authority of the Permanent Secretary. Any comments provided by a Ministry without the authority of the relevant Minister, especially where they focus on technical or operational issues, shall not in any way limit that Minister’s flexibility in raising other issues in the subsequent Cabinet discussion.

To avoid adding unnecessary bureaucratic delays, especially where other Ministries fail to respond quickly to draft submissions, other Ministries should be given a strict limit of 5 working days to provide comments on a draft submission. Cabinet Liaison Officers should give priority to meeting these consultation requirements within this deadline. Any undue delay by a Ministry in providing comments shall be referred by the originating Ministry to the Secretary to the Cabinet, to ensure that Cabinet consideration is not unnecessarily delayed or stalled. If necessary, the Secretary to the Cabinet may report persistent problems to the Prime Minister as the Chair of the Cabinet.