The Complete Yes Minister

What he means by ‘dangerous precedent’ is that if we do the right thing now, then we might be forced to do the right thing again next time. And on that reasoning nothing should ever be done at all. [To be precise: many things may be done, but nothing must ever be done for the first time – Ed.]

I told him I wasn’t going to budge on my proposal. He resorted to barefaced lies, telling me that he was fully seized of my aims and had taken them on board and would do his best to put them into practice.

So I asked him point blank if he would put my policy into practice. He made me his usual offer. I know it off by heart now. A recommendation that we set up an interdepartmental committee with fairly broad terms of reference so that at the end of the day we would be in a position to think through all the implications and take a decision based on long-term considerations rather than rush prematurely into precipitate and possibly ill-conceived action that might well have unforeseen repercussions. [In other words: No! – Ed.]

I wasn’t prepared to be fobbed off with this nonsense any longer. I told him I wanted action now. He went pale. I pointed out that, in my case, honours are fundamentally unhealthy. Nobody in their right mind can want them, they encourage sycophancy, snobbery and jealousy. ‘And,’ I added firmly, ‘it is not fair that civil servants get them all.’

Humphrey argued again. ‘We have done something to deserve them. We are civil servants,’ he said.

‘You just like having letters to put after your name to impress people,’ I sneered. ‘You wouldn’t impress people if they knew what they stood for: KCB? Knight Commander of the Most Noble Order of the Bath? Bloody daft. They’d think you were a plumber. I think they should shove the whole lot down the Most Noble Order of the Plughole.’

Humphrey wasn’t at all amused. ‘Very droll,’ he said condescendingly. ‘You like having letters after your name too,’ he continued. ‘PC,⁵ MP. And your degree – BSc.Econ., I think,’ he sneered and slightly wrinkled up his elegant nose as if there were a nasty smell underneath it.

‘At least I earned my degree,’ I told him, ‘not like your MA. At Oxford they give it to you for nothing, when you’ve got a BA.’

‘Not for nothing. For four guineas,’ he snapped spitefully.

I was tired of this juvenile bickering. And I had him on the run. I told him that I had made my policy decision and that was the end of it. ‘And what was your other point?’ I enquired.

Humphrey was in such a state of shock about the Honours List that he had forgotten his other point. But after a few moments it came back to him.

It seems that Baillie College, Oxford, will be in serious trouble over the new ruling on grants for overseas students.

Humphrey said that nothing would please Baillie more than to take British students. Obviously that’s true. But he explained that Baillie has easily the highest proportion of foreign students and that the repercussions will be serious at the schools of Tropical Medicine and International Law. And the Arabic Department may have to close down completely.

I’m sympathetic to all this, but hard cases make bad law. I just don’t see how it’s possible for us to go on educating foreigners at the expense of the British taxpayer.

‘It’s not just foreigners, Minister,’ explained Humphrey. ‘If, for instance, our Diplomatic Service has nowhere to immerse its recruits in Arab culture, the results could be catastrophic – we might even end up with a pro-Israeli Foreign Office. And what would happen to our oil policy then?’

I said that they could send their diplomatic recruits elsewhere.

‘Where else,’ he demanded, ‘can they learn Arabic?’

‘Arabia?’ I suggested.

He was stumped. Then Bernard chipped in. ‘Actually, Minister, Baillie College has an outstanding record. It has filled the jails of the British Empire for many years.’

This didn’t sound like much of a recommendation to me. I invited Bernard to explain further.

‘As you know,’ he said, ‘the letters JB are the highest honour in the Commonwealth.’

I didn’t know.

Humphrey eagerly explained. ‘Jailed by the British. Gandhi, Nkrumah, Makarios, Ben-Gurion, Kenyatta, Nehru, Mugabe – the list of world leaders is endless and contains several of our students.’

Our students? He had said our students. It all became clear.

I smiled benignly. ‘Which college did you go to, Humphrey?’

‘Er . . . that is quite beside the point, Minister.’

He wasn’t having a very good day. ‘I like being beside the point, Humphrey,’ I said. ‘Humour me. Which college did you go to? Was it Baillie, by any strange coincidence?’

‘It so happens,’ he admitted with defiance, ‘that I am a Baillie man, but that has nothing to do with this.’