TBA

The London County Council, from its inception, followed the practice which had obtained under the Metropolitan Board of Works of preserving virtually all the documents which were before a committee or sub-committee at its meetings (not merely the more important reports, etc circulated with the agenda papers) and binding them in a series of volumes running parallel to the series of volumes of signed minutes. Except in the case of meetings of the Council itself and its Education and Public Assistance Committees (whose minutes were saleable to the public), no considerable body of background information tended to be incorporated in the minutes themselves and the attention of students is accordingly drawn to the desirability of consulting the presented papers of committees and sub-committees in conjunction with their study of the minutes.

Presented papers are normally bound chronologically, meeting by meeting and, within a meeting, follow the order of item numbers in the minutes, the item number usually being endorsed on the presented document in its top right-hand corner. Separate indexes from those associated with the minutes are not therefore called for.

The following are the exceptions to the system described above;-

a) There are no presented papers for certain minor special and ad hoc committees and sub-committees.

(b) Certain classes of plans and drawings were not retained by the Committee Clerks but were permitted to be returned to the department of origin.

(c) Certain plans and drawings of too large a size to be bound in with the presented papers are separately stored.

(d) The system of presented paper was not applied to the Education Committee and it sub-committees until September, 1940. The important reports, etc circulated before the meetings will, ever be found bound in with the agendas papers.

(e) The presented papers of the Asylums Committee up to the end of 1919 and some of its sub-committees up to somewhat later dates were sent for salvage during the Second World War.

(f) The presented papers of the Housing of the Working Classes Committee and the Public Health and Housing Committee between March, 1889 and December 1906 are bound subject by subject and not chronologically. From 1907, the normal chronological system is followed.

(g) The presented papers of the Theatres and Music Halls Committee between March 1889 and October 1909 are bound theatre by theatre and not chronologically with six additional volumes bound subject by subject. From October 1909, the normal chronological system is followed.