Council was the first governing body of the College of Nursing and was established to oversee the setting up of the College. The formats of meetings changed significantly over time, with earlier meetings having less of a formal structure than later ones.
On the whole, papers of Council meetings include attendance lists; reports of the sections, departments and boards of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN); discussions about premises and staff; agendas for open and closed meetings; minutes of open and closed meetings; supporting papers relating to the College and professional nursing issues under discussion; reports of the standing committees of the RCN; copies of publications. From 1916-1981 no agendas, action sheets or loose supporting papers are included. From 1981 onwards the amount and quality of the supporting paperwork varies from year to year. Council minutes were circulated as print copies up to 2010 only and subsequently as electronic.
All volumes apart from the first (1916-1918) are indexed.
After 1939 these records relate to the Royal College of Nursing.
One copy set of Council minutes, which covers the dates 1916-2010, is kept in Store A. The other set, which covers 1916-2009 and includes original signed minutes, is kept in Store B. From 1998 there are also digital records from most years until 2009 when they become entirely digital born records.