The Complete Yes Minister

17 The Moral Dimension

May 14th

I am writing this entry, not in my London flat or in my constituency house, but in the first-class compartment of a British Airways flight to the oil sheikhdom of Qumran.

We have been en route to the Persian gulf for about four and a half hours, and we should be landing in about forty-five minutes.

I’m very excited. I’ve never flown first-class before, and it’s quite different. They give you free champagne all the way and a decent meal instead of the usual monosodium glutamate plus colouring.

Also, it’s nice being a VIP — special lounge, on the plane last, general red-carpet treatment.

We’re going there to ratify the contract for one of the biggest export orders Britain has ever obtained in the Middle East.

But when I say ‘we’ I don’t just mean me and Bernard and Humphrey. In fact, I asked for an assurance in advance that we couldn’t be accused of wasting a lot of government money on the trip. Humphrey assured me that we were taking the smallest possible delegation. ‘Pared to the bone’ was the phrase he used, I distinctly remember. But now I realise that there may have been some ulterior motive in keeping me in the VIP lounge till the last possible minute.

When I actually got onto the plane I was aghast. It is entirely full of civil servants. In fact it transpires that the plane had to be specially chartered because there are so many of us going.

I immediately challenged Humphrey about the extravagance of chartering an aircraft. He looked at me as though I were mad, and said that it would be infinitely more expensive for all of us to go on a scheduled flight.

I’m perfectly sure that’s true. My argument is with the size of the party. ‘Who are all these people?’ I asked.

‘Our little delegation.’

‘But you just said the delegation has been pared to the bone.’

He insisted that it was. I asked him, again, to tell me who they all are. And he told me. There’s a small delegation from the FCO because, although it’s a DAA mission, the FCO doesn’t like any of us to go abroad except under their supervision. I can’t really understand that, foreign policy is not at issue on this trip, all we are doing is ratifying a contract that has already been fully negotiated between the Government of Qumran and British Electronic Systems Ltd.

Anyway, apart from the FCO delegation, there is one from the Department of Trade, and one from Industry. Also a small group from Energy, because we’re going to an oil sheikhdom. (If you ask me, that’s completely irrelevant — I reckon the Department of Energy would still demand the right to send a delegation if we were going to Switzerland — they’d probably argue that chocolate gives you energy!) Then there’s a Dep. Sec. leading a team from the Cabinet Office, a group from the COI.[44] And finally, the whole of the DAA mission: my press office, half my private office, liaison with other departments, secretaries, those from the legal department who did the contract, those who supervised the contract… the list is endless.

One thing’s certain: it’s certainly not been pared to the bone. I reminded Humphrey (who is sitting next to me but has nodded off after going at the free champagne like a pig with his snout in the trough) that when we were going to meet the Qumranis in Middlesbrough there were only going to be seven people coming with us.

‘Yes Minister,’ he had nodded understandingly. ‘But Teesside is perhaps not quite so diplomatically significant as Qumran.’

‘Teesside returns four MPs,’ I remarked.

‘Qumran controls Shell and BP.’

Then, suddenly, a most interesting question occurred to me.

‘Why are you here?’ I asked.

‘Purely my sense of duty free,’ is what I thought he had replied. I interrupted gleefully. ‘Duty free?’

He held up his hand, asking to be allowed to finish what he was saying. ‘Duty, free from any personal considerations.’

Then, changing the subject suspiciously quickly, he handed me a document headed Final Communiqué, and asked me to approve it.

I was still silently fuming about over a hundred Civil Service freeloaders on this trip. The whole lot of them with their trip paid for, and getting paid for coming. Whereas when I’d asked if Annie could come too I’d been told that a special dispensation would be needed from the King of Qumran before she could attend any public functions with me — and that, in any case, I’d have to pay for her fares, hotel bill, everything.

These bloody civil servants have got it all completely sewn up to their own advantage. This trip is costing me hundreds of pounds because Annie really wanted to come. She’s sitting opposite, chatting to Bernard, looking as though she’s having a thoroughly good time. That’s nice, anyway.

Anyway, I digress. I suddenly realised what was in my hand. Humphrey had written a final communiqué before the meeting. I told him he couldn’t possibly do that.

‘On the contrary, Minister, you can’t write the communiqué after the meeting. We have had to get agreement from half a dozen other departments, from the EEC Commission, from Washington, from the Qumrani Embassy — you can’t do that in a few hours in the middle of the desert.’

So I glanced at it. Then I pointed out that it was useless, hypothetical, sheer guesswork — it may bear no relation to what we actually say.

Sir Humphrey smiled calmly. ‘No communiqué ever bears any relation to what you actually say.’

‘So why do we have one?’

‘It’s just a sort of exit visa. Gets you past the press corps.’ Oh, I forgot to mention, the back third of this mighty aeroplane is stuffed with drunken hacks from Fleet Street, all on freebies too. Everyone except my wife, for whom I have to pay! ‘The journalists need it,’ Sir Humphrey was saying, ‘to justify their huge expenses for a futile non-event.’

I wasn’t sure that I liked my trade mission to Qumran being described as a futile non-event. He obviously saw my face fall, for he added: ‘I mean, a great triumph for you. Which is why it’s a futile non-event for the press.’

He’s right about that. Journalists hate reporting successes. ‘Yes, what they really want is for me to get drunk at the official reception.’

‘Not much hope of that.’

I asked why not, and then realised I’d asked a rather self-incriminating question. But Humphrey seemed not to notice. Instead, he replied gloomily, ‘Qumran is dry.’

‘Well, it is in the desert, isn’t it?’ I said and then I suddenly grasped what he meant. Islamic Law! Why hadn’t I realised? Why hadn’t I asked? Why hadn’t he told me?

It seems that we can get a drink or two at our own Embassy. But the official reception and dinner are at the Palace. For five solid hours. Five hours without a single drinkie.

I asked Humphrey if we could manage with hip flasks.

He shook his head. ‘Too risky. We have to grin and bear it.’

So I sat here and read the communiqué which was full of the usual guff about bonds between our two countries, common interests, frank and useful conversations and all that crap. Humphrey was reading the FT.[45] I was wondering what we would do if the talks were so far removed from what it says in the communiqué that we couldn’t sign it. Suppose there were to be a diplomatic incident at the reception. I’d have to contact London somehow. I’d need some way of directly communicating with the Foreign Secretary, for instance, or even the PM.

And then the idea flashed into my mind.

‘Humphrey,’ I suggested tentatively, ‘can’t we set up a security communications room next door to the reception? At the Sheikh’s Palace, I mean? With emergency telephones and Telex lines to Downing Street. Then we could fill it with cases of booze that we’ll smuggle in from the Embassy. We could liven up our orange juice and nobody would ever know.’

He gazed at me in astonishment. ‘Minister!’

I was about to apologise for going too far, when he went on, ‘That is a stroke of genius.’

I thanked him modestly, and asked if we could really do it.

Musing on it for a moment, he said that a special communications room would only be justified if there were a major crisis.

I pointed out that five hours without a drink is a major crisis.

We decided that, as the pound is under pressure at the moment, a communications room could be justified.

Humphrey has promised his enthusiastic support for the project.

[It seems that this diplomatically dangerous prank was put into effect immediately on arrival in Qumran. Certainly, British Embassy files show that instructions for installing a British diplomatic communications room were given on the day the Trade Mission arrived in Qumran. Prince Mohammed gave his immediate permission and a telephone hot line to Downing Street was swiftly installed, plus a scrambler, a couple of Telexes and so forth.

Photo by courtesy of FCO, Middle East Desk

This temporary communications centre was situated in a small ante-room near to one of the Palace’s main reception areas. The following day the British party arrived at the Palace. James Hacker was accompanied by his wife Annie. The Qumranis had found it difficult to refuse permission as Her Majesty the Queen had previously been received at the Palace and thus the precedent had been set for admitting special women on special occasions.

Shortly after the reception began, at which orange juice was being served, Hacker was presented with a gold and silver rosewater jar, as a token of the esteem in which the Qumrani government held the British — Ed.]

May 17th

Yesterday we went to the teetotal reception at Prince Mohammed’s palace, and today I’ve got the most frightful hangover.

Unfortunately I don’t remember the end of the reception awfully clearly, though I do have a hazy memory of Sir Humphrey telling some Arab that I’d suddenly been taken ill and had to be rushed off to bed. Actually that was the truth, if not the whole truth.

It was a very large reception. The British delegation was a bloody sight too big to start with. And then there were an enormous number of Arabs there too.

The evening more or less started with the presentation to me of a splendid gift accompanied by diplomatic speeches about what a pleasure it is to commemorate this day. Subsequently, chatting with one of the Arab guests it transpired that apparently it’s a magnificent example of seventeenth-century Islamic Art, or so he said.

I asked what it was for originally. He said it was a rosewater jar. I said I supposed that that meant it was for rosewater, and the conversation was already getting rather bogged down along these lines when Bernard arrived at my elbow with the first of the evening’s urgent and imaginative messages. Though I must admit that, at first, I didn’t quite follow what he was saying.

‘Excuse me, Minister, there is an urgent call for you in our communications room. A Mr Haig.’

I thought he meant General Haig. But no.

‘I actually mean Mr Haig, Minister — you know, with the dimples.’

I nodded in a worried sort of way, said ‘Ah yes’ importantly, excused myself and hurried away to the communications room.

I must say Humphrey had seen to it that someone had set the whole thing up beautifully. Phones, Telex, a couple of our security chaps with walkie-talkies, cipher machines, the works.

And just in case the place was bugged by our hosts I was careful not to ask for a drink but to ask for the message from Mr Haig. Immediately one of our chaps poured some Scotch into my orange juice. It looked browner, but no one could really tell.

SIR BERNARD WOOLLEY RECALLS:[46]

The official reception at the Palace of Qumran was an evening that I shall never forget. Firstly, there was the extraordinary strain of covering up for Hacker’s increasing drunkenness. And not only Hacker, in fact: several members of the British delegation were in on the secret and it was noticeable that their glasses of orange juice became more and more golden brown as the evening wore on.

But that evening also saw the start of a most unfortunate chain of events that might have led to an early end of my career.

Mrs Hacker was the only woman present. They’d made her a sort of honorary man for the evening. And while Hacker was off getting one of his refills, she remarked that the rosewater jar would look awfully good on the corner table of her hall in London.

It fell to me to explain to her that it was a gift to the Minister.

At first she didn’t understand, and said that it was his hall too. I had to explain that it was a gift to the Minister qua Minister, and that she would not be allowed to keep it. I was naturally mindful of the near-scandal caused by the Tony Crosland coffee-pot incident, which had occurred only a few years earlier.

She wanted to know if they were supposed to give it back. Clearly not. I explained that it would have been a frightfully insulting thing to do. So she observed, rather sensibly, that if she couldn’t keep it and couldn’t give it back, she couldn’t see what she could do.

I explained that official gifts become the property of the government, and are stored in some basement somewhere in Whitehall.

She couldn’t see any sense in that. I couldn’t either, except that clearly it is not in the public interest for Ministers to be allowed to receive valuable gifts from anybody. I explained that one might keep a gift valued up to approximately fifty pounds.

She asked me how you found out the value. I said that you get a valuation. And then she flattered me in a way that I found irresistible. She asked me to get a valuation, said that it would be ‘wonderful’ if it were less than fifty pounds, because it was ‘awfully pretty’, and then told me that I was absolutely wonderful and she didn’t know what they would do without me.

Regrettably, I fell for it, and promised that I would see what I could do.

Meanwhile I was being sent on errands by Hacker. He returned from one of his many trips to the temporary Communications Centre which we’d set up, telling me loudly that there was a message for me from Mr John Walker. From the Scotch Office. Aware that we could easily be overheard, I asked if he meant the Scottish Office.

As I left very much in need of some whisky, Mrs Hacker asked if there was a message for her.

‘Of course there is, darling,’ the Minister replied hospitably. ‘Bernard will collect it for you if you give him your glass.’ I shot him a meaningful look and he continued, ‘if you give him your glass he’ll get you some orange juice too.’

I stayed close to the Minister’s side for most of the evening which was just as well because he continually made tactless remarks. At one point he was looking for Sir Humphrey and I led him across to where Sir Humphrey and a man named Ross (from the FCO) were talking to Prince Mohammed.

Unfortunately both Ross and Sir Humphrey looked like Qumranis when approached from behind, as they were both dressed in full Arab robes and headdresses. In spite of Prince Mohammed’s presence, Hacker was unable to disguise his shock as Sir Humphrey turned. He asked Humphrey why on earth he was dressed up like that.

Prince Mohammed and Sir Humphrey Appleby — kindly lent by the Trustees of the Archives of the Anglo-Arabian Friendship League

Sir Humphrey explained that this was a traditional Foreign Office courtesy to our hosts. Ross confirmed that this was spot on, and Prince Mohammed said that indeed he regarded it as a most warm and gracious compliment. Nonetheless Hacker took Sir Humphrey aside and, in a voice that had not been lowered sufficiently, said: ‘I can’t believe my eyes. What have you come as? Ali Baba?’

I really did find it most awfully funny. Old Humphrey began to explain that when in Rome… and so forth. Hacker wasn’t having any truck with that.

‘This is not Rome, Humphrey,’ he said severely. ‘You look ridiculous.’ This was undeniably true, but Humphrey found it rather wounding to be told. Hacker didn’t let it go at that, either. ‘If you were in Fiji, would you wear a grass skirt?’

Humphrey replied pompously that the Foreign Office took the view that, as the Arab nations are very sensitive people, we should show them whose side we’re on.

Hacker remarked: ‘It may come as a surprise to the Foreign Office, but you are supposed to be on our side.’

I decided that their conversation should continue in private, so I interrupted them and told Sir Humphrey that the Soviet Embassy was on the line — a Mr Smirnoff. And then I told Hacker, who was looking distinctly thirsty, that there was a message for him from the British Embassy Compound. The school. A delegation of Teachers.

He brightened up immediately, and, hurrying off, made some dreadful pun about going to greet the Teachers at once, before the Bell’s goes.

Prince Mohammed sidled up to me, and observed softly that we were all receiving a great many urgent messages. There was no twinkle in his eye, no hint that he had spotted that all the British orange juice was turning steadily browner — and yet, I wondered if he realised what was going on. To this day, of course, I still don’t know.

Unwilling to prolong the conversation, I edged away. And I found myself face to face with a smiling Arab who had been close to me earlier in the evening when I was talking to Annie Hacker about the rosewater jar. This next conversation, with its fateful consequences, is the first reason why this whole evening is etched forever on my memory.

Although dressed in traditional Arab style, the smiling Arab spoke perfect English and clearly knew the West only too well.

‘Excuse me, Effendi,’ he began, ‘but I could not help overhearing your conversation about valuing the gift. Perhaps I can help.’

I was surprised. And grateful. And I asked if he had any idea how much it was worth.

He smiled. ‘Of course. An original seventeenth-century rosewater jar is very valuable.’

‘Oh dear,’ I said, thinking of Annie Hacker’s disappointment.

‘You are not pleased?’ Naturally, he was a little surprised.

I hastened to explain. ‘Yes — and no. I mean if it is too valuable, the Minister is not allowed to keep it. So I was hoping it wasn’t.’

He understood immediately, and smiled even more. ‘Ah yes. Well, as I was saying, an original seventeenth-century rosewater jar is very valuable but this copy, though excellently done, is not of the same order.’

‘Oh good. How much?’

He was a very shrewd fellow. He eyed me for a moment, and then said, ‘I should be interested to hear your guess.’

‘A little under fifty pounds?’ I asked hopefully.

‘Brilliant,’ he replied without hesitation. ‘Quite a connoisseur!’

I asked him if he could sign a valuation certificate. He agreed, but added that our English customs are very strange. ‘You are so strict about a little gift. And yet your electronics company pays our Finance Minister a million dollars for his co-operation in securing this contract. Is that not strange?’

Of course, I was utterly horrified. I said that I hoped he didn’t mean what I thought he meant.

He smiled from ear to ear. ‘Of course. I work for the Finance Ministry. I got my share of the money.’

‘For what?’

‘For keeping my mouth shut!’

It seemed to me that someone would be asking for that money back from him any time now. But excusing myself as quickly as I decently could, I made my way hurriedly through the crowd, looking for Sir Humphrey. Not easy as he was still dressed up like one of the natives.

I found Sir Humphrey talking to the Minister, of all people. Rather clumsily, I asked if I could have a word with Sir Humphrey in private. Hacker told me that I could speak freely. Momentarily nonplussed, because of the enormity of the information that I was about to reveal to Sir Humphrey, I came up with a foolproof way of removing Hacker from the room for a couple of minutes.

‘Minister,’ I said, ‘you’re wanted in the Communications Room. The VAT man.’ He looked blank. ‘About your ’69 returns.’ He must have had a great deal too much already for he just stared at me as if I was mad, until I was forced to say, ‘Vat 69’.

‘Ah. Ah. Yes,’ he said, turned gleefully, bumped into a hovering prince, and spilt what was left of his previous drink.

‘Bernard,’ Sir Humphrey took me by the arm and led me quickly to one side. ‘I’m beginning to think that the Minister’s had almost as many urgent messages as he can take.’

I was glad he’d led me to a quiet corner. I immediately blurted out that I had just found out the most terrible thing: that the contract was obtained by bribery.

Sir Humphrey, to my intense surprise, was completely unconcerned. Not only that, he knew. He told me that all contracts in Qumran were obtained by bribery. ‘Everybody knows that. It’s perfectly all right as long as nobody knows.’

I was pretty sure that the Minister didn’t know. I suggested telling him.

‘Certainly not,’ Sir Humphrey admonished me.

‘But if everybody knows…’

‘Everybody else,’ he said firmly. ‘You do not necessarily let Ministers know what everybody else knows.’

At the crucial moment in the discussion two people converged upon us. From our right, His Royal Highness, Prince Feisal. And from our left, the Minister, looking distinctly the worse for wear.

‘Ah, Lawrence of Arabia,’ cried Hacker as he lurched towards Sir Humphrey. ‘There’s a message for you in the communications room.’

‘Oh?’ said Sir Humphrey, ‘who is it this time?’

‘Napoleon,’ announced the Minister, giggled, then fell to the floor.

[Hacker’s diary continues — Ed.]

May 19th

Back in England, and back at the office. Feel rather jet-lagged. I often wonder if we statesmen really are capable of making the wisest decisions for our countries in the immediate aftermath of foreign travel.

Today there was a most unfortunate story in the Financial Times, reporting a story from the French press.

I showed it to Bernard. A lot of use that was!

‘Webs don’t form blots, Minister,’ was his comment.

‘What?’ I said.

‘Spiders don’t have ink, you see. Only cuttlefish.’ Sometimes I think that Bernard is completely off his head. Spiders don’t have cuttlefish. I couldn’t see what he meant at all. Sometimes I wonder if he says these idiotic things so that he can avoid answering my questions. [Another sign of Hacker’s growing awareness — Ed.]

So I asked him, directly, what he thought about publishing a baseless accusation of this kind against British Electronic Systems.

He muttered that it was terrible, and agreed with me that the squalid world of baksheesh and palm-greasing is completely foreign to our nature. ‘After all, we are British,’ I remarked.

He agreed without hesitation that we are British.

But there was something shifty in his manner. So I didn’t let it drop. ‘And yet,’ I said, ‘it’s not like the FT to print this sort of thing unless there’s something behind it.’

And I looked at him and waited. Bernard seemed to me to be affecting an air of studious unconcern.

‘There isn’t anything behind it, is there Bernard?’

He got to his feet, and looked at the newspaper. ‘I think the sports news is behind it, Minister.’

Clearly there is something behind it, and clearly Bernard has been told to keep his mouth shut. Tomorrow I have a meeting with Humphrey first thing in the morning. And I intend to get to the bottom of this matter.

May 20th

My meeting with Humphrey.

I began by showing him the article in the FT. Though I think Bernard must have drawn his attention to it already.

I told him that I wanted to know the truth.

‘I don’t think you do, Minister.’

‘Will you answer a direct question, Humphrey?’

He hesitated momentarily. ‘Minister, I strongly advise you not to ask a direct question.’

‘Why?’

‘It might provoke a direct answer.’

‘It never has yet.’

It was clear to me yesterday that Bernard knows something about all this. I don’t think he was levelling with me. So today I put him on the spot, in front of Humphrey, so that he couldn’t say one thing to his Minister and another to his Permanent Secretary. [This brilliant move by Hacker struck at the heart of the entire Private Secretary system — Ed.]

‘Bernard, on your word of honour, do you know anything about this?’

He stared at me like a frightened rabbit. His eyes flickered briefly at Sir Humphrey who — like me — was gazing at him in the hope (but without the confidence) that he would say the appropriate thing.

Bernard clearly didn’t know how to reply, proof enough that he knew something fishy had been going on.

‘Well, I, er, that is, there was, er, someone did…’

Humphrey interrupted hastily. ‘There was a lot of gossip, that’s all. Rumour. Hearsay.’

I ignored Humphrey. ‘Come on Bernard.’

‘Um… well, one of the Qumranis did tell me he had received, er, been paid…’

‘Hearsay, Minister,’ cried Humphrey indignantly.

I indicated Bernard. ‘Hearsay?’

‘Yes,’ Humphrey was emphatic. ‘Bernard heard him say it.’

Clearly I was going to get nothing further out of Bernard. But he’d told me all I needed to know.

‘Humphrey. Are you telling me that BES got the contract through bribery?’

He looked pained. ‘I wish you wouldn’t use words like “bribery”, Minister.’

I asked if he’d prefer that I use words like slush fund, sweeteners, or brown envelopes. He patronisingly informed me that these are, in his view, extremely crude and unworthy expressions for what is no more than creative negotiation. ‘It is the general practice,’ he asserted.

I asked him if he realised just what he was saying. After all, I ratified this contract myself, in good faith. ‘And in that communiqué I announced to the press a British success in a fair fight.’

‘Yes,’ he mused, ‘I did wonder about that bit.’

‘And now,’ I fumed, ‘you are telling me we got it by bribery?’

‘No, Minister,’ he replied firmly.

There seemed to be a light at the end of the tunnel. My spirits lifted. ‘Ah,’ I said, ‘we didn’t get it by bribery.’

‘That’s not what I said,’ he said carefully.

‘Well what did you say?’

‘I said I am not telling you we got it by bribery.’

Pure sophistry if ever I heard any. It seemed there was no light at the end of the tunnel after all. Or if there was, it was turning out to be the proverbial oncoming train. So I asked him how he described the payments that had been made.

‘You mean, how does the contract describe them?’ he asked, to make it clear that he would never describe them at all, under any circumstances.

To cut a long story short, Bernard gave me a list of informal guidelines for making these payments, a list that is in highly confidential circulation among top multinational companies.

To me the scale of corruption was even more appalling than the fact that it was going on. [A typical Hacker response. Clearly, corruption was perfectly acceptable to Hacker in smallish amounts. As subsequently became clear in the affair of the rosewater jar — Ed.]

I asked how the payments were generally made.

‘Anything from a numbered account in the Swiss Bank to a fistful of used oncers slipped under the door of the gents.’

He was so casual about it. He couldn’t see how shocking it was. He said he couldn’t, anyway.

I spluttered almost incoherently about bribery and corruption being sin. And a criminal offence.

‘Minister.’ He gave me a patient smile. ‘That is a narrow parochial view. In other parts of the world they see it quite differently.’

‘Humphrey! Sin is not a branch of geography!’

But he argued that sin is a branch of geography, that in developing countries the size of the ‘extra-contractual payment’ is the means of showing how serious you are about the deal. When a multinational makes a big ‘political contribution’ it simply demonstrates that it expects big profits.

[It is like a publisher’s advance to an author. The one who pays the biggest advance is the one who is going for the biggest sales — Ed.]

‘You’re telling me,’ I asked, ‘that winking at corruption is government policy?’

‘Oh no Minister! That would be unthinkable. It could never be government policy. Only government practice.’

His double standards leave me quite breathless.

In the middle of this unprecedented discussion [Not so — Ed.] the press office rang. They wanted a statement about the Qumran bribery allegation. I had no idea what to say to them. I asked Humphrey for his help.

‘I’m sure the press office can draft something convincing and meaningless,’ he said obligingly. ‘That’s what they’re paid for, after all.’

I told him he was an appalling cynic. He took that as a compliment, remarking that a cynic is only a term used by an idealist to describe a realist.

I realised from his remark about the press office that he expected me to help with some cover-up if necessary. A shocking suggestion. Or implication, to be precise, since he hadn’t exactly suggested it. And then, I also realised I had an alternative.

‘I’ll tell the truth,’ I said abruptly.

‘Minister! What are you thinking of!’

‘I knew nothing of this. Why should I defend what I never approved?’

Then he trotted out all the usual stuff. That the contract is worth thousands of British jobs, and millions of export dollars, and that we can’t throw all that away for some small technical irregularity.

I explained, again, that it is not a small technical irregularity, but corruption!

‘No Minister, just a few uncontracted prepayments…’

I had heard enough. I was forced to explain to him that government is not just a matter of fixing and manipulating. There is a moral dimension.

‘Of course, Minister. A moral dimension. I assure you it is never out of my thoughts.’

‘So,’ I went on, ‘if this question comes up in the House, or if the papers start asking questions, I shall announce an inquiry.’

‘Excellent idea,’ he agreed. ‘I shall be more than happy to conduct it.’

I took a deep breath. ‘No Humphrey. Not an internal inquiry. A real inquiry.’

His eyes widened in horror. ‘Minister! You can’t be serious!’

‘A real inquiry!’ I repeated emphatically.

‘No, no, I beg you!’

‘The moral dimension.’ It really is time moral issues were made central to our government once again. And I’m the man to do it.

SIR BERNARD WOOLLEY RECALLS:[47]

It was shortly after the day that Hacker threatened a real inquiry into the Qumran deal that I went to Hacker’s London flat to collect him en route for an official visit to the Vehicle Licensing Centre in Swansea. Some morale-boosting was urgently called for down there, because the installation of the labour-saving computers had caused such delays that thousands more staff had been taken on to sort out the chaos. It looked as though larger computers would now be necessary, at some considerable public expense, partly in order to handle the situation and partly in order to avoid our having to lay off all the extra employees now working there. As job-creation was central to our strategy in the depressed or Special Development Areas [i.e. Marginal Constituencies — Ed.] it was important to find something for these chaps to do. Clearly Hacker was not able to make any useful contribution in that area, but Sir Humphrey felt that a goodwill visit from the Minister would keep things friendlier for the time being and would make it look as though something was being done while we all racked our brains and tried to think what!

In any event, to cut a long story short [too late — Ed.] I was standing in the Minister’s front hall chatting to Mrs Hacker, waiting for the Minister to finish dressing, when I saw the rosewater jar from Qumran, and commented that it looked awfully nice.

Mrs Hacker agreed enthusiastically, and added that a friend of hers had dropped in that day and had been frightfully interested.

‘Really?’

‘Yes.’ And then she dropped the bombshell. ‘Her name’s Jenny Goodwin — from The Guardian.’

‘The Guardian,’ I said, quietly stunned.

‘Yes. She asked me where it came from.’

‘A journalist,’ I muttered, aghast.

‘Yes. Well… The Guardian, anyway. She asked what it was worth, and I said about fifty quid.’

‘You said about fifty quid.’ My bowels had turned to water. I felt hot and cold simultaneously. I could hardly speak. I just tried to keep the conversation going somehow.

‘Yes. Fifty quid.’ She was looking at me strangely now. ‘Funnily enough, she thought it was genuine.’

‘She thought it was genuine,’ I repeated.

‘Yes, Bernard, you sound like an answering machine.’

I apologised.

Mrs Hacker then told me that the journalist, one Jenny Goodwin, had asked if she could ring up the Qumrani Embassy to ask what it was worth.

‘To ask what it was worth,’ I mumbled, hopelessly.

She looked at me keenly. ‘It is only a copy, isn’t it Bernard?’ she asked.

I managed to say that so far as I knew, and so I was led to believe, and so forth, and then the Minister hurried downstairs and my bacon was saved. For the time being. But I knew that the jig was up and that my career was on the line, my neck was on the block, and my next appointment was likely to be at the Jobcentre in the Horseferry Road.

My only hope was that the Minister would come to my defence when the facts came out. After all, I’d always done my best for him. I didn’t think I could expect much sympathy or help from Sir Humphrey. But I had no choice but to tell him the whole story as soon as I could.

[The following morning Bernard Woolley made a special request for an urgent meeting with Sir Humphrey Appleby. Sir Humphrey made a note about it, which we found in the Departmental files at Walthamstow — Ed.]

BW requested an urgent meeting. He asked for a word with me. I said yes, and waited, but he did not speak. So I told him that I’d said yes.

Again he did not speak. I noticed that he was sweating, but it was a cool day. He seemed to be in a state of considerable mental anguish, such as I had never observed in him before.

I asked the standard questions. I thought perhaps that Woolley had sent the Minister to the wrong dinner, given him the wrong speech, or — worst of all — shown him some papers that we didn’t mean him to see.

He shook his head silently, and I divined that the situation was even worse than that. So I told him to sit down, which he did gratefully. I waited.

It slowly emerged that the exquisite rosewater jar, given to the Minister in Qumran, was the root of the problem. Apparently the Minister’s wife liked it. Not surprising. BW had explained the rules to her, and she had looked terribly sad. They always do. Then she had asked if it was really worth more than fifty pounds, and said how marvellous it would be if it wasn’t. And BW, it seems, had agreed to ‘help’.

I understand his motives, but a seventeenth-century vase — well, really!

BW then explained that there was a ‘terribly nice Qumrani businessman’. And this fellow had apparently valued it as a copy and not as an original. For £49.95. A most convenient sum.

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.

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.

So I adopted a brisk tone like the family doctor. ‘What seems to be the trouble?’ I asked in my best bedside manner.

‘Two things,’ she said, ‘both of them rather worrying to the public.’

How dare she speak for the public, who know nothing about any of it? And never will, if I can help it!

She started with the French allegation of BES corruption in getting the Qumrani contract.

‘Absolute nonsense,’ I said categorically. If in doubt, always issue an absolute denial. And if you’re going to lie, then lie with one hundred per cent conviction.

‘But they quoted reports of payments to officials,’ she said.

I pretended to lose my rag. I fixed her with a piercing gaze. ‘This is absolutely typical. A British company slogs its guts out to win orders and create jobs and earn dollars, and what do they get from the media? A smear campaign.’

‘But if they won by bribery…’

I talked over her. ‘There is no question of bribery — I have had an internal inquiry and all these so-called payments have been identified.’

‘What as?’ she asked, slightly on the retreat.

Humphrey saw his opportunity to help.

‘Commission fees,’ he said quickly. ‘Administrative overheads.’

He’d given me time to think — ‘Operating costs. Managerial surcharge,’ I added.

Bernard chimed in too. ‘Introduction expenses. Miscellaneous outgoings.’

I thundered on. ‘We have looked into every brown envelope,’ I found myself saying, but changed it to ‘balance sheet’ in the nick of time. ‘And everything is in order.’

‘I see,’ she said. She really didn’t have a leg to stand on. She had no proof at all. She had to believe me. And I’m sure she knew only too well the risk of incurring the wrath of a Minister of the Crown with false allegations and accusations.

[We get the impression that Hacker, like many politicians, had the useful ability to believe that black was white merely because he was saying so — Ed.]

I told her that the allegations she was making were the symptoms of a very sick society for which the media must take their share of the blame. I demanded to know why she wanted to put thousands of British jobs at risk. She had no answer. [Naturally, as she did not want to put thousands of British jobs at risk — Ed.] I told her that I would be calling on the Press Council to censure the press for a disgraceful breach of professional ethics in running the story.

‘Indeed,’ I continued, rather superbly I thought, ‘the Council, and the House of Commons itself must surely be concerned about the standards that have applied in this shameful episode, and pressure will be brought to bear to ensure that this type of gutter press reporting is not repeated.’

She looked stunned. She was completely unprepared for my counter-attack, as I thought she would be.

Nervously she collected herself and asked her second question, with a great deal less confidence, I was pleased to see. ‘This rosewater jar, apparently presented to you in Qumran?’

‘Yes?’ I snapped, belligerently.

‘Well…’ she panicked but continued, ‘I saw it in your house actually.’

‘Yes,’ I replied, ‘we’re keeping it there temporarily.’

‘Temporarily?’

‘Oh yes,’ I was doing my ingenuous routine now. ‘It’s very valuable, you see.’

‘But Mrs Hacker said it was an imitation.’

I laughed. ‘Burglars, you silly girl. Burglars! We didn’t want gossip going around. Until we’ve got rid of it.’

Now she was completely confused. ‘Got rid of it?’

‘Of course. I’m presenting it to our local museum when we get back to the constituency on Saturday. Obviously I can’t keep it. Government property, you know.’ And then I came out with my master stroke. ‘Now — what was your question?’

She had nothing else to say. She said it was nothing, it was all right, everything was fine. I charmingly thanked her for dropping in, and ushered her out.

Humphrey was full of admiration.

‘Superb, Minister.’

And Bernard was full of gratitude.

‘Thank you, Minister.’

I told them it was nothing. After all, we have to stick by our friends. Loyalty is a much underrated quality. I told them so.

‘Yes Minister,’ they said, but somehow they didn’t look all that grateful.