The Complete Yes Minister

‘It’s fairly new, Minister. It used to be called British Equatorial Africa. It’s the red bit a few inches below the Mediterranean.’

I can’t see what Buranda has got to do with us. Surely this is an FCO job. [Foreign and Commonwealth Office – Ed.] But it was explained to me that there was an administrative problem because Her Majesty is due to be up at Balmoral when the President arrives. Therefore she will have to come to London.

This surprised me. I’d always thought that State Visits were arranged years in advance. I said so.

‘This is not a State Visit,’ said Sir Humphrey. ‘It is a Head of Government visit.’

I asked if the President of Buranda isn’t the Head of State? Sir Humphrey said that indeed he was, but also the Head of Government.

I said that, if he’s merely coming as Head of Government, I didn’t see why the Queen had to greet him. Humphrey said that it was because she is the Head of State. I couldn’t see the logic. Humphrey says that the Head of State must greet a Head of State, even if the visiting Head of State is not here as a Head of State but only as a Head of Government.

Then Bernard decided to explain. ‘It’s all a matter of hats,’ he said.

‘Hats?’ I was becoming even more confused.

‘Yes,’ said Bernard, ‘he’s coming here wearing his Head of Government hat. He is the Head of State, too, but it’s not a State Visit because he’s not wearing his Head of State hat, but protocol demands that even though he is wearing his Head of Government hat, he must still be met by . . .’ I could see his desperate attempt to avoid either mixing metaphors or abandoning his elaborately constructed simile. ‘. . . the Crown,’ he finished in triumph, having thought of the ultimate hat.

I said that I’d never heard of Buranda anyway, and I didn’t know why we were bothering with an official visit from this tin-pot little African country. Sir Humphrey Appleby and Bernard Woolley went visibly pale. I looked at their faces, frozen in horror.

‘Minister,’ said Humphrey, ‘I beg you not to refer to it as a tin-pot African country. It is an LDC.’

LDC is a new one on me. It seems that Buranda is what used to be called an Underdeveloped Country. However, this term has apparently become offensive, so then they were called Developing Countries. This term apparently was patronising. Then they became Less Developed Countries – or LDC, for short.

Sir Humphrey tells me that I must be clear on my African terminology, or else I could do irreparable damage.

It seems, in a nutshell, that the term Less Developed Countries is not yet causing offence to anyone. When it does, we are immediately ready to replace the term LDC with HRRC. This is short for Human Resource-Rich Countries. In other words, they are grossly overpopulated and begging for money. However, Buranda is not an HRRC. Nor is it one of the ‘Haves’ or ‘Have-not’ nations – apparently we no longer use those terms either, we talk about the North/South dialogue instead. In fact it seems that Buranda is a ‘will have’ nation, if there were such a term, and if it were not to cause offence to our Afro-Asian, or Third-World, or Non-Aligned-Nation brothers.

‘Buranda will have a huge amount of oil in a couple of years from now,’ confided Sir Humphrey.

‘Oh I see,’ I said. ‘So it’s not a TPLAC at all.’

Sir Humphrey was baffled. It gave me pleasure to baffle him for once. ‘TPLAC?’ he enquired carefully.

‘Tin-Pot Little African Country,’ I explained.

Sir Humphrey and Bernard jumped. They looked profoundly shocked. They glanced nervously around to check that I’d not been overheard. They were certainly not amused. How silly – anyone would think my office was bugged! [Perhaps it was – Ed.]

November 12th

On my way to work this morning I had an inspiration.

At my meeting with Humphrey yesterday it had been left for him to make arrangements to get the Queen down from Balmoral to meet the Burandan President. But this morning I remembered that we have three by-elections pending in three marginal Scottish constituencies, as a result of the death of one member who was so surprised that his constituents re-elected him in spite of his corruption and dishonesty that he had a heart attack and died, and as a result of the elevation of two other members to the Lords on the formation of the new government. [The Peerage and/or the heart attack are, of course, the two most usual rewards for a career of corruption and dishonesty – Ed.]

I called Humphrey to my office. ‘The Queen,’ I announced, ‘does not have to come down from Balmoral at all.’

There was a slight pause.

‘Are you proposing,’ said Sir Humphrey in a pained manner, ‘that Her Majesty and the President should exchange official greetings by telephone?’

‘No.’

‘Then,’ said Sir Humphrey, even more pained, ‘perhaps you just want them to shout very loudly.’

‘Not that either,’ I said cheerfully. ‘We will hold the official visit in Scotland. Holyrood Palace.’

Sir Humphrey replied instantly. ‘Out of the question,’ he said.

‘Humphrey,’ I said. ‘Are you sure you’ve given this idea due consideration?’

‘It’s not our decision,’ he replied. ‘It’s an FCO matter.’

I was ready for this. I spent last night studying that wretched document which had caused me so much trouble