SECRET.
EXECUTIVE BOARD
Wednesday, 9th April, 1941.

Copy on A/706

B.B.C. Propaganda Research Reports.

Extract from Minute from Lord Hood to Director General.

Apart from the Weekly Analysis of Foreign Broadcasts, and special studies, there are a weekly series of reports dealing with particular countries, Great Britain, U.S.A., Germany, France, etc., etc. It is impossible for the Minister to read through all this literature and I am afraid that in practice it is equally impossible for his Private Secretaries to digest them with the care and regularity required, so that they can be submitted to the Minister in the form in which he can easily read them. I do not know whether you find the same difficulty.

As a result, I put these reports on one side and the copies I receive are really tantamount to wastepaper. So far as you and the Minister are concerned, these reports are not for action but merely for information, and possibly no great harm is done by the Minister failing to read them.

On the other hand, there would be advantage in the Minister following the general trend of broadcasting propaganda, if only to ensure that the Departments of the Ministry concerned are taking the necessary action on the conclusions revealed in these reports.

Would it not be possible to work out some arrangement whereby these reports did not reach the Minister and you in their present naked form, but were digested beforehand by some official who would either summarise briefly the salient features or draw attention to those portions of the report which deserve to be read in full?

I am sending a note on similar lines to Mr. Herbert in regard to the Postal Censorship Reports.

(Signed) H.

5th April, 1941.