The Complete Yes Minister

1

‘Hacker’s constituency party Chairman.

2

Frank Weisel.

3

K means Knighthood. KCB is Knight Commander of the Bath. G means Grand Cross. GCB is Knight Grand Cross of the Bath.

4

FROLINAT was the National Liberation Front of Chad, a French acronym. FRETELIN was the Trust For the Liberation of Timor, a small Portuguese colony seized by Indonesia: a Portuguese acronym. ZIPRA was the Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army, ZANLA the Zimbabwe African Liberation Army, ZAPU the Zimbabwe African People’s Union, ZANU the Zimbabwe African National Union, CARECOM is the acronym for the Caribbean Common Market and COREPER the Committee of Permanent Representatives to the European Community — a French acronym, pronounced co-ray-pair. ECOSOC was the Economic and Social Council of the UN, UNIDO the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation, IBRD the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and OECD was the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. GRAPO could not conceivably have been relevant to the conversation, as it is the Spanish acronym for the First of October Anti-Fascist Revolutionary Group.

It is not impossible that Sir Humphrey may have been trying to confuse his Minister.

5

Hacker might perhaps have been thinking of the Polish shipbuilding deal during the Callaghan government, by which the UK lent money interest free to the Poles, so that they could buy oil tankers from us with our money, tankers which were then going to compete against our own shipping industry. These tankers were to be built on Tyneside, a Labour-held marginal with high unemployment. It could have been said that the Labour government was using public money to buy Labour votes, but no one did — perhaps because, like germ warfare, no one wants to risk using an uncontrollable weapon that may in due course be used against oneself.

6

The Bureaucratic Watchdog was an innovation of Hacker’s, to which members of the public were invited to report any instances of excessive government bureaucracy which they encountered personally. It was disbanded after four months.

7

In conversation with the Editors.

8

In conversation with the Editors.

9

Dr Donald Hughes was the Prime Minister’s Senior Policy Adviser, brought into government from outside. Tough, intelligent, hard-bitten and with no love for senior civil servants.

10

Hacker was clearly right about this. On the same euphemistic principle, the Ministry of War was renamed the Ministry of Defence, and the Department responsible for unemployment was called the Department of Employment.

11

The Council for the Protection of Rural England.

12

In conversation with the Editors.

13

In conversation with the Editors.

14

The Crichel Down affair in 1954 was possibly the last example of a Minister accepting full responsibility for a scandal within his Department, about which he did not know and could not have known. Nevertheless, Sir Thomas Dugdale, then Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, accepted that as the Minister he was constitutionally responsible to Parliament for the wrong actions of his officials, even though their actions were not ordered by him and would not have been approved by him. He resigned, was kicked upstairs to the Lords and a promising career came to an end. No Minister since then has been — depending on your point of view — either so scrupulous or so foolish.

15

The 800 people with the rank of Under-Secretary and above.

16

A sign of growing awareness here from Hacker.

17

Meaning without respect.

18

In conversation with the Editors.

19

In conversation with the Editors.

20

Vintage port.

21

In fact, the size of Oxford University is limited by the University Grants Committee. Baillie might not even have been allowed to take more home students, except by taking them from other colleges. The other colleges would be unlikely to agree to this, because it would put them in jeopardy.

22

Translation: who guards the guards? A quotation from Juvenal’s Satires and not, as is commonly supposed in political circles, from juvenile satires.

23

The Oxford term for the second part of the classics degree course.

24

Privy Counsellor.

25

First among equals.

26

Brand name of popular packaged sliced loaf, not of the kind customarily consumed at High Table.

27

In conversation with the Editors.

28

Originally said by Mr Harold Wilson as he then was.

29

Department of Industry

30

A left-wing politician prominent in the 1970s and the early 1980s, a peer’s son educated at Westminster and Oxford, chiefly remembered for his lisp, his staring eyes, and his earnest attempts to disguise his privileged background by drinking mugs of tea in workers’ co-operatives.

31

In conversation with the Editors.

32

Hacker’s driver.

33

In conversation with the Editors.

34

One of Hacker’s rare jokes.

35

In conversation with the Editors.

36

In conversation with the Editors.

37

In conversation with the Editors.

38

Birmingham East.

39

Hacker’s Party HQ.

40

That ominous phrase from a civil servant.

41

Bernard Wolley was, for once in his life, inaccurate in his pedantry. A cobbler is one who mends footwear, and therefore it is widely held by modern scholars who have researched this part of the Hacker diaries that CGSM stood for a Consignment of Geriatric Shoe Menders. An alternative possibility is that Woolley was merely being facetious, although this possibility has not found favour with the academic community.

42

Senior Citizens.

43

OAPs.

44

Central Office of Information.

45

Financial Times.

46

In conversation with the Editors.

47

In conversation with the Editors.

48

‘Beware of Greeks bearing gifts’ is the usual rough translation.

49

London School of Economics.

50

A hole in the head.

51

In conversation with the Editors.

52

Department of Education and Science.

53

Originally said by Frederick the Great, King Frederick II of Prussia.

54

Her Majesty’s Government.

55

‘No man is an Island, entire of itself… Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.’ — John Donne.

56

In conversation with the Editors.

57

In conversation with the Editors

58

In conversation with the Editors.

59

Rat-catchers.

60

Brand of sleeping pills in common use in the 1980s.