The Complete Yes Minister

I asked BW if he had believed this man. He wavered. ‘I . . . er . . . he said he was an expert . . . well . . . he spoke Arabic awfully well, so I er . . . accepted his valuation. In good faith. After all, Islam is a jolly good faith.’

Not a convincing explanation, I felt. I told him that he had taken a grave risk, and he was fortunate that no one had asked any questions.

I was intending to let the matter drop, and merely record a reprimand in his report. But at this juncture he informed me that a journalist from The Guardian had seen the jar in Hacker’s house, that Mrs Hacker had said it was a copy, and that further questions were to be asked.

It is a great tragedy that the press are so horribly suspicious about this sort of thing. But I told BW that we had no option but to inform the Minister.

[Hacker’s diary continues – Ed.]

May 23rd

Humphrey had made a submission on Friday (sounds like wrestling, doesn’t it?). In other words, he submitted a paper to me, suggesting various methods of hushing up this bribery scandal.

Obviously I was not intending to go out of my way to reveal it. But equally I couldn’t see how I could allow myself to be put in the position of sweeping bribery under the carpet. So if questions were asked, I had every intention of announcing a full independent enquiry chaired by a QC.

I explained this to Humphrey at the start of our meeting this morning. He started going on about the contract being worth £340 million. ‘Get thee behind me, Humphrey,’ I said, and reminded him of the moral dimension of government. The contract may be worth £340 million, but my job’s worth even more to me.

But then Humphrey told me that Bernard had something to tell me. I waited. Bernard was looking very anxious. Finally he coughed and began to speak, rather haltingly.

‘Um . . . you know that jar the Qumranis gave you?’

I remembered it well. ‘Yes, we’ve got it in the flat. Most attractive.’

I waited. Clearly he was worried about something.

‘I told Mrs Hacker that it was all right to keep it,’ he said, ‘because I had it valued at under fifty pounds. But I’m not sure . . . the man who valued it was awfully nice . . . I told him Mrs Hacker liked it a lot . . . but he might have been er, being helpful.’

I still couldn’t see any problem. So I told him not to worry, and that no one will ever know. In fact, I was rash enough to congratulate him for being jolly enterprising.

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.