SUGGESTED PROCEDURE AND ALLOCATION OF RESPONSIBILITIESBETWEEN THE MINISTRIES OF FOOD AND INFORMATION ON PUBLICITY CAMPAIGNS

(1) The Ministry of Food is responsible for policy. It is therefore responsible for and should have the final say on the verbal content of advertisements and on their visual expression, so far as that reflects policy.

(2) The Ministry of Information is responsible for the translation of policy into publicity. To it would therefore fall the creation of the form of the advertisement, style of presentation, and mainly allocation between different media and choice of individual media in any group. It would employ its own trained publicity knowledge and that of the agents it appoints to this end.

(3) It is recognised that there are borderline cases in (1) and (2) which could only be solved by really active co-operation.

(4) It is suggested that an officer with publicity experience should be appointed from the General Division of the Ministry of Information to handle all the day-to-day contact and discussion which will be inevitable in the production of campaigns.

(5) The Director and/or Deputy Director of the General Division would of course attend any meetings which involved serious questions of policy.

(6) The Ministry of Information should, as the centralised publicity unit of the Government, choose the Agents on the recommendation of the Advisory Committee.

(7) The Ministry of Food should be able at all times to consult with and instruct on policy or doctrine the Agents and any individual members of the Agencies. The liaison officer from the Ministry of Information should, however, have the right to be present at any such interviews whenever he wishes (which, of course, would not be always), and copies of all letters and documents passing between the Ministry of Food and the Agents must be sent to him.

The following suggestion made at the Conference on the 22nd February cannot be accepted by the Ministry of Information, if the charge is to come on their vote:-

That plans for the campaign should be prepared by the Ministry of Food, who would instruct the Agents and only show the finished campaign to the Ministry of Information when it was more or less complete.

Such a procedure could only be acceptable to the Ministry of Information if the expenditure came on the Ministry of Food vote and the Ministry of Information were acting in a purely advisory capacity, without responsibility.

23rd February. 1940