Downing Street's claim that the Cabinet meeting in Birmingham was the first outside London since 1921 is rejected by a former Cabinet Secretary, who points out that one took place in Brighton in 1966.

In a letter to The Times, Lord Armstrong of Ilminster said that he minuted a Cabinet meeting at the Brighton Grand Hotel on October 4, 1966.

Harold Wilson, the Prime Minister, called an emergency meeting at the start of the Labour conference, which agreed to use statutory powers for a compulsory freeze on prices and incomes, Lord Armstrong writes. Neither Wilson's 1966 meeting nor Mr Brown's yesterday shared the excitement of the first Cabinet beyond Downing Street or Chequers, held in September 1921 as the future of Anglo-Irish relations hung in the balance.

It was chaired in Inverness by David Lloyd George, the last Liberal to be Prime Minister.

Times Archive, 1921: Cabinet meeting in Inverness

The capital of the Highlands, has today come near to being the capital of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and - especially - Ireland

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David Lloyd George, the last Liberal to be Prime Minister, was on holiday at Gairloch in Wester Ross when Éamon de Valera announced an “irrevocable rejection” of the government's peace offer. The Irish leader repudiated King and Empire, implying that only full independence would satisfy Sinn Fein's demands.

With King George V shooting at nearby Moy and several Cabinet ministers also in Scotland, Lloyd George summoned his coalition government to Inverness for an emergency session. Eight ministers travelled 700 miles through the night to attend, taking regular class sleeper train seats.

Lloyd George and several ministers stayed at nearby Brahan Castle as guests of Lord and Lady Seaforth. Waiting for Lloyd George on his arrival was a box of cigars sent from London by an anonymous group of American tourists. The accompanying message thanked the Prime Minister for his attempts to “solve the age-long Irish problem” and expressed hope that “Ireland and Great Britain might soon smoke together the pipe of peace”.

Sixteen Cabinet ministers - among them Winston Churchill and Stanley Baldwin, two Viscounts and six Knights - met, decked out in city suits and hats, at Inverness Town Hall on September 7th. There in the Council Chamber they drew up the 'Inverness Formula', which formed the basis of fresh treaty discussions. Three months later the discussions resulted in the Anglo-Irish Treaty, which agreed the creation of the Irish Free State, Eire.

David Lloyd George lasted just over a year as Prime Minister after the Inverness Cabinet meeting. His Conservative-dominated coalition government was deeply divided and he struggled as a 'Prime Minister without a party'. After a string of scandals including selling titles for money and threatening war against Turkey the Conservatives withdraw their support, forcing Lloyd George to resign in October 1922.

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