The Complete Yes Minister

As it happens, I’d left my dictaphone running, and his remarks were recorded for posterity. What he actually said to me was: ‘Minister, the traditional allocation of executive responsibilities has always been so determined as to liberate the Ministerial incumbent from the administrative minutiae by devolving the managerial functions to those whose experience and qualifications have better formed them for the performance of such humble offices, thereby releasing their political overlords for the more onerous duties and profound deliberations that are the inevitable concomitant of their exalted position.’

I couldn’t imagine why he thought I wouldn’t want to hear that. Presumably he thought it would upset me — but how can you be upset by something you don’t understand a word of?

Yet again, I begged him to express himself in plain English. This request always surprises him, as he is always under the extraordinary impression that he has done so.

Nevertheless, he thought hard for a moment and then, plainly, opted for expressing himself in words of one syllable.

‘You are not here to run this Department,’ he said.

I was somewhat taken aback. I remarked that I think I am, and the public thinks so too.

‘With respect,’ he said, and I restrained myself from punching him in the mouth, ‘you are wrong and they are wrong.’

He then went on to say that it is his job to run the Department. And that my job is to make policy, get legislation enacted and — above all — secure the Department’s budget in Cabinet.

‘Sometimes I suspect,’ I said to him, ‘that the budget is all you really care about.’

‘It is rather important,’ he answered acidly. ‘If nobody cares about the budget we could end up with a Department so small that even a Minister could run it.’

I’m sure he’s not supposed to speak to me like this.

However, I wasn’t upset because I’m sure of my ground. ‘Humphrey,’ I enquired sternly, ‘are we about to have a fundamental disagreement about the nature of democracy?’

As always, he back-pedalled at once when seriously under fire. ‘No, Minister,’ he said in his most oily voice, giving his now familiar impression of Uriah Heep, ‘we are merely having a demarcation dispute. I am only saying that the menial chore of running a Department is beneath you. You were fashioned for a nobler calling.’

Of course, the soft soap had no effect on me. I insisted on action, now! To that end, we left it that he would look at my reorganisation plan. He promised to do his best to put it into practice, and will set up a committee of enquiry with broad terms of reference so that at the end of the day we can take the right decisions based on long-term considerations. He argued that this was preferable to rushing prematurely into precipitate and possibly ill-conceived actions which might have unforeseen repercussions. This seems perfectly satisfactory to me; he has conceded the need for wide-ranging reforms, and we might as well be sure of getting them right.

Meanwhile, while I was quite happy to leave all the routine paperwork to Humphrey and his officials, from now on I was to have direct access to all information. Finally, I made it clear that I never again wished to hear the phrase, ‘there are some things it is better for a Minister not to know.’

February 20th

Saturday today, and I’ve been at home in the constituency.

I’m very worried about Lucy. [Hacker’s daughter, eighteen years old at this time — Ed.] She really does seem to be quite unbalanced sometimes. I suppose it’s all my fault. I’ve spent little enough time with her over the years, pressure of work and all that, and it’s obviously no coincidence that virtually all my successful colleagues in the House have highly acrimonious relationships with their families and endlessly troublesome adolescent children.

But it can’t all be my fault. Some of it must be her own fault! Surely!

She was out half the night and came down for a very late breakfast, just as Annie and I were starting an early lunch. She picked up the Mail with a gesture of disgust — solely because it’s not the Socialist Worker, or Pravda, I suppose.

I had glanced quickly through all the papers in the morning, as usual, and a headline on a small story on an inside page of The Guardian gave me a nasty turn. HACKER THE BADGER BUTCHER. The story was heavily slanted against me and in favour of the sentimental wet liberals — not surprising really, every paper has to pander to its typical reader.

Good old Grauniad.

I nobly refrained from saying to Lucy, ‘Good afternoon’ when she came down, and from making a crack about a sit-in when she told us she’d been having a lie-in.

However, I did ask her why she was so late home last night, to which she replied, rather pompously, ‘There are some things it is better for a father not to know.’ ‘Don’t you start,’ I snapped, which, not surprisingly, puzzled her a little.