Classic, hybrid or full: choosing the register for your minutes

Two sets of minutes of the same session can both be correct and look nothing alike. One recounts what was said, in the third person, in a few lines per contribution. The other reproduces each speaker's words, from beginning to end. The difference lies in the writing register, and it is one of the first things set when a body starts working on Plenários.pt.

There are three possible registers. To compare them, we always use the same contribution, by a fictional councillor, on an activity plan.

Classic: reported speech

In Latin, oratio obliqua. The minutes recount what was said, in the third person and in the tense of the report. It is the traditional register of Portuguese public administration and the most compact to read.

Councillor Ana Costa expressed agreement with the proposal, stressing that the activity plan increases investment in the municipal school network for the first time in four years.

What you gain: short, consistent minutes that are easy to consult years later. What you lose: the exact words. Whoever drafts chooses what is essential in each contribution, and that choice is what the review has to confirm.

Hybrid: reported, with the exact words when they matter

Reported speech remains the rule, but some passages are transcribed word for word: vote statements, proposals read out in session and passages a member asks to have recorded in their own words.

Councillor Ana Costa expressed agreement with the proposal and submitted the following vote statement, asking for it to be recorded in the minutes: "I vote in favour because this plan increases investment in the municipal school network for the first time in four years."

It is often the register bodies already practise without naming it: they report everything and transcribe whatever someone asks to have on record.

Full: the same words, from beginning to end

In Latin, ipsis verbis. The minutes are a faithful transcription of what was said, in the very same words, from beginning to end. Some standing orders require it, and it is common in bodies where the exact wording of a contribution may be challenged.

Councillor Ana Costa: "Thank you, Mr Chair. I am voting in favour, and I would like it on record why: this plan increases investment in the municipal school network for the first time in four years."

It is the longest register, and the one where the quality of the recording matters most. That is why the first drafting stage on the platform, the source audit, flags from the outset the passages where the audio cannot be made out.

The three side by side

How to choose

Four questions help you decide.

1. What do the standing orders say? It is the first answer and sometimes the only one: some standing orders set the register. If yours do, the choice is made.
2. Who reads the minutes, and what for? A citizen looking for a resolution on the portal reads reported minutes more easily. A lawyer who needs the content of a contribution wants the exact words.
3. Are contributions often challenged? If approving the minutes regularly brings requests to correct what someone said, the full register, or at least the hybrid one, saves arguments.
4. How much time is there for review? Full minutes of a long session mean much more text to check. Review is still quick, but there is more of it.

The register is a written decision, not a learned habit

On Plenários.pt, each body's style is not obtained by training the AI on old minutes. It is set explicitly, on a dedicated screen for each body, where staff specify the writing register, the in-house terminology and the forms of address.

This has a practical consequence: the rule can be read, discussed and changed by whoever answers for the minutes. If the standing orders change, the body's configuration changes and the next minutes come out in the new register. Old minutes can still be brought into the platform, where OCR makes them searchable by content alongside the new ones.

Would you like to see the same session written in all three registers? It is one of the things we show in the demo. You can also compare the examples on the AI minutes page.