1480 IMPERIAL UNITY [PART VIII 
beyond the seas. The Prime Minister of the United King- 
dom will be ex officio President, and the Prime Ministers of 
the self-governing Dominions ex officio members, of the 
Conference. The Secretary of State for the Colonies will be 
an ex officio member of the Conference, and will take the chair 
in the absence of the President. He will arrange for such 
Imperial Conferences after communication with the Prime 
Ministers of the respective Dominions. 
Such other ministers as the respective Governments may 
appoint will also be members of the Conference, it being 
understood that, except by special permission of the Con- 
ference, each discussion will be conducted by not more than 
two representatives from each Government, and that each 
Government will have only one vote. 
That it is desirable to establish a system by which the 
several Governments represented shall be kept informed 
during the periods between the Conferences in regard to 
matters which have been or may be subjects for discussion, 
by means of a permanent secretarial staff, charged, under 
the direction of the Secretary of State for the Colonies, with 
the duty of obtaining information for the use of the Con- 
ference, of attending to its resolutions, and of conducting 
correspondence on matters relating to its affairs.! 
That upon matters of importance requiring consultation 
between two or more Governments which cannot conveniently 
be postponed until the next Conference, or involving subjects 
of a minor character or such as call for detailed consideration, 
subsidiary Conferences ? should be held between representa- 
tives of the Governments concerned svecially chosen for the 
purpose. 
Military matters were dealt with by the adoption of the 
principle of the establishment of a General Staff for the 
Empire, which should study military science in all its branches, 
should collect and disseminate to the various Governments 
military information and intelligence, should undertake the 
preparation of schemes of defence on a common principle and, 
while not interfering with questions of command and adminis- 
tration, should at the request of the respective Governments 
! This was carried into effect by a reorganization of the Colonial Office in 
1908 ; see Parl. Pap., Cd. 3795; 5273, pp. 1-12. 
* Under this clause a Naval and Military Conference was held in 1909 
(Parl. Pap., Cd. 4948), and a Copyright Conference in 1910 (Parl. Pap., 
Cd. 5272). Cf. the Survevors’ Conference of 1911: Cd. 5776.