Four decades after we wrote Yes Minister, politics is still reduced to the pleasure of power platform

WWhen people complimented Tony Jay and me on the Minister’s foresight, we graciously accepted the praise. But the reason the series always feels current, and still does 40 years later, is that nothing really changes. When I was writing the sequel, Yes, Prime Minister, in 1986, I went to the Daily Telegraph offices in Fleet Street to read stories from 1956. I was curious to see how much things had changed. guess what? They didn’t.

The bigger story was about the war in the Middle East (the Suez Crisis). The government lied about its Middle East adventure, which was a miserable failure, and the truth was leaking out even though it tried to suppress it. Soviet forces invaded Hungary, leading to a refugee crisis in Europe. The “special relationship” with the United States was in doubt due to Washington’s disagreement with British and French defense policy. Questions were raised about the impartiality and independence of the BBC. There was a fear of inflation, and a plan to improve regional disparities. I could go on but you get the idea.

Last month there was a story about the Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson. She had promised legislation to protect freedom of expression and protect academics from their students. But 370 university professors, including three Nobel laureates, accused her of kicking the tall grass. Yes Minister followers know that just because a Minister wants something done, doesn’t mean it will get done. I think some officials in the department were not happy with the cancellation of professors, and they blocked it.

Before our programme, most people thought that civil servants were silly men in hats who sat around drinking tea. This is how they are usually portrayed in comedy shows. We revealed that Whitehall employed 3,000 intelligent, highly educated people unknown to the public who were discreetly running the country. This is one of the reasons why politicians love Yes Minister. It gave them an excuse.

We didn’t actually reveal it. Richard Crossman did. His memoirs of a Cabinet minister were published in the Sunday Times, and the government of which he was an important part sued Jonathan Cape, the publisher. From 1964 to 1966, Crossman kept detailed notes on Cabinet meetings, and the Attorney General sought an order to “restrain” the book due to breach of confidentiality, which he claimed threatened collective liability. This was nonsense. As always, the government simply wanted to avoid embarrassment, but lost this historic case. It was a huge victory for press freedom, and our first major source for Yes Minister.

In his memoirs, Crossman’s private secretary says “Yes, Minister” when he means “No, Minister” and when faced with an overcrowded inbox, Crossman explains that if he simply moved everything from inbox to outbox the civil service would take care of it. The Minister need not do anything more than that. Very few people read political memoirs and the general public still does not know how things were done, or rather not done. Reading Crosman’s memoirs was a revelation that confirmed to us that there was a comedy series waiting to be written.

People said the series, books and new play I’m Sorry, Prime Minister were about politics. But we were writing about government, which is not the same thing. Politics at its best is a legitimate struggle between special interests, a struggle over how best to improve society for the people. At its worst, it is simply a struggle for power – control of its citizens, power for pleasure.

Like most politicians, our Minister (later Prime Minister and now Professor at Oxford College) Jim Hacker started out with the best of motives: the desire to make the world a better place. But he’s like Graham Greene’s whiskey priest. As you climb what Disraeli called the “fatty pole,” you support many policies that you believe are wrong, because as they used to say in the US Senate: “You have to get ahead so you can go on.”

Why? Because even though you’re not sure what you believe in anymore, you want the ability to do it. She wants to win the next elections. Otherwise, you will remain out in the cold, frozen politically on the green opposition benches. In the immortal words of Snoopy creator Charles M. Schultz: “Winning isn’t everything. But losing isn’t anything.”