The Complete Yes Minister

Then came the bad news. ‘Yes, but you see, Mrs Hacker told me this morning that a Guardian journalist came round and started asking questions.’

This was horrifying! I asked to see the valuation. It was written on the back of the menu. [The Treasury were never awfully happy about valuations written on the backs of menus – Ed.]

I asked what the jar was really worth. Humphrey had the information at his fingertips. If it’s a copy, then the valuation is roughly correct. But if it’s an original – ?5000.

And I had kept it!

If I’d had a day or two to consider the matter there would have been no problem. It would have been pretty easy to dream up some valid explanation of the situation, one that got both me and Bernard off the hook.

But at that moment Bill Pritchard came bursting in from the press office. And he brought even worse news!

The Guardian had been on the phone to him. They’d been on to the Qumrani Embassy, telling them that my wife had said that this extremely valuable seventeenth-century thing presented to me by the Qumrani Government was a copy. The Qumrani Government was incensed at the suggestion that they insulted Britain by giving me a worthless gift. (Though I can’t see the point of giving me a valuable gift if it’s got to be stored in the vault forever.) The FCO then phoned Bill and told him it was building up into the biggest diplomatic incident since Death of a Princess.

I thought I’d heard enough bad news for one day. But no. He added that Jenny Goodwin of The Guardian was in the private office, demanding to see me right away.

I thought Annie had always described Jenny Goodwin as a friend of hers. Some friend! You just can’t trust the media! Despicable, muck-raking nosey parkers, always snooping around trying to get at the truth!

Bernard looked beseechingly at me. But it was clear that I had no choice.

‘My duty is clear,’ I said in my Churchillian voice. ‘I have no choice.’

‘No choice?’ squeaked Bernard, like Piglet confronting the Heffalump.

I made it clear that indeed I had no choice. My wife had not asked him to lie about the value of the gift. He admitted she hadn’t. I explained to Bernard that I fully realised that he had done this with the best of possible motives, but that there could be no excuse for falsifying a document.

He protested that he hadn’t. But of course he was hair-splitting.

But my trouble is, I never know when to stop. I then launched into a tremendously self-righteous tirade. I told him that I cannot have it thought that I asked him to do this. Then I turned on Humphrey, and told him that I cannot have it thought that I will tolerate bribery and corruption in our business dealings. ‘Enough is enough,’ I went on, digging my own grave relentlessly. ‘If this journalist asks me straight questions about either of these matters I must give straight answers. There is a moral dimension.’

I should have realised, since Humphrey was looking so thoroughly unflappable, that he had an ace up his sleeve. I didn’t guess. And he played it.

‘I agree with you, Minister. I see now that there is a moral dimension to everything. Will I tell the press about the communications room or will you?’

Blackmail. Shocking, but true! He was clearly saying that if I laid the blame for (a) the bribery and corruption, or (b) the rosewater jar – neither of which were my fault – at his door or Bernard’s door or anyone’s door (if it comes to that) then he would drop me right in it.

I think I just gaped at him. Anyway, after a pause he murmured something about the moral dimension. Hypocritical bastard.

I tried to explain that the communications room was not the same thing at all. Completely different, in fact. Drinking is nothing to do with corruption.

But Humphrey would have none of it. ‘Minister, we deceived the Qumranis. I am racked with guilt, tormented by the knowledge that we violated their solemn and sacred Islamic laws in their own country. Sooner or later we must own up and admit that it was all your idea.’

‘It wasn’t,’ I said desperately.

‘It was,’ they chorused.

I would have denied it, but it was their word against mine. And who would ever take the word of a mere politician against that of a Permanent Secretary and a Private Secretary?

Sir Humphrey piled on the pressure. ‘Is it fifty lashes or one hundred?’ he asked Bernard, who seemed to be brightening up a little.

In what seemed like an interminable pause, I contemplated my options. The more I contemplated my options the more they disappeared, until I didn’t seem to have any at all. Finally Bill said that I had to meet the journalist or she would write something terrible anyway.

I nodded weakly. Humphrey and Bernard hovered. I knew that only one possible course was open to me. Attack! Attack is always the best form of defence, especially when dealing with the press.

And after all, dealing with the press is my stock-in-trade. That is what I’m best at.

[That is what Ministers had to be best at. At that time the Minister’s main role was to be the chief public relations man for his Ministry – Ed.]

I sized her up in no time as she came into the office. Attractive voice, slightly untidy pulled-through-a-hedge- backwards sort of look, trousers, absolutely what you’d expect from The Guardian – a typical knee-jerk liberal, Shirley Williams type.

As she came in a rough strategy formed in my mind. I was charming, but cool, and gave her the impression that I was fairly busy and didn’t have too much time to spare. If you don’t do that, if you let them think that you think they are important, it confirms their suspicions that they are on to something.