Right, I've copied it up now. I've basically included the entire sketch. Hacker's parts are red, Humphrey's green and Bernard's blue.
(Jim’s opening a card or something )–
‘That the lot, Bernard?’
‘Well, before you go home for the holidays, minister, Sir Humphrey has something to say to you.’
(Bernard goes to the door of the Private Office and lets Humphrey in, who is looking flustered)
‘Ah, thank you, Bernard. Minister, just one thing- I wonder if I might crave your momentary indulgence in order to discharge a by no means disagreeable obligation, which has over the years has become more or less established practice within government circles as we approach the terminal period of the year calends, of course, not financial. In fact, not to put too fine a point on it, week fifty- one, and submit to you, with all appropriate deference for your consideration at a convenient juncture, a sincere and sanguine expectation and, indeed confidence- in fact, one might go so far as to say ‘hope’ that the aforementioned period may be, at the end of the day, when all relevant factors have been taken into consideration, susceptible of being deemed to be such as to merit a final verdict of having been by no means unsatisfactory in it’s overall outcome and in the final analysis, to give grounds for being judged, on mature reflection, to have been conducive to generating a degree of gratification which will be seen in retrospect to have been significantly higher than the general average.’
‘What’s he talking about, Bernard?!’
‘Well, Minister, I think Sir Humphrey just wanted to crave your momentary indulgence in order to discharge a by no means disagreeable obligation-’
‘Alright, alright, alright Bernard, but Humphrey-’
‘At the end of the day, minister, all things being…’
‘Humphrey!’
‘Yes, minister?’
‘Are you saying “Happy Christmas”?’
(incredulous) ‘Yes, minister.’
(Bernard blows a party whistle thing ). I love the speech and everything, but that last bit just cracked me up!
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ae23902000
19 years ago
One class line is when Jim has Humphrey on the run, he's squirming about the mess he made thirty years before and has to fess up:
"Minister, I think there is something that perhaps you ought to know. The identity of the official whose alleged responsibility for this hypothetical oversight has been the subject of recent discussion is not shrouded in quite such impenetrable obscurity as certain previous disclosures may have led you to assume, but not to put too fine a point on it: the individual in question is, it may surprise you to learn, one whom your present interlocutor is in the habit of defining by means of the perpendicular pronoun."
Brilliant writing!
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Mexiward
19 years ago
How about:
Sir Humphrey: Yes, yes, yes, yes I do see that there is a real dilemma here, in that while it has been government policy to regard policy as the responsibility of Ministers and administration as the responsibility of officials, the questions of administrative policy can cause confusion between the policy of administration and the administration of policy, especially when responsibility for the administration of the policy of administration conflicts or overlaps with responsibility for the policy of administration of policy.
Betty Oldham: Well that's a load of meaningless drivel, isn't it?
Sir Humphrey: It is not for me to comment on government policy. You must ask the Minister.
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TheSummoningDark
18 years ago
Hacker: Humphrey, surely you're not comparing yourself to Elizabeth Taylor.
Humphrey: Of course not, Minister...she didn't get a first from Oxford.
Hacker: Who else is in this department?
Sir Humphrey: Well briefly, sir, I am the Permanent Under Secretary of State, known as the Permanent Secretary. Woolley here is your Principal Private Secretary. I too have a Principal Private Secretary and he is the Principal Private Secretary to the Permanent Secretary. Directly responsible to me are ten Deputy Secretaries, 87 Under Secretaries and 219 Assistant Secretaries. Directly responsible to the Principal Private Secretaries are plain Private Secretaries, and the Prime Minister will be appointing two Parliamentary Under Secretaries and you will be appointing your own Parliamentary Private Secretary.
Hacker: Can they all type?
Humphrey: If there had been investigations, which there haven't, or not necessarily, or I'm not at liberty to say whether there have, there would have been a project team which, had it existed, on which I cannot comment, which would now have disbanded, if it had existed, and the members returned to their original departments, if indeed there had been any such members.
Hacker: When you give your evidence to the Think Tank, are you going to support my view that the civil service is overmanned and feather-bedded, or not? Yes or no? Straight answer.
Humphrey: Well Minister, if you ask me for a straight answer, then I shall say that, as far as we can see, looking at it by and large, taking one thing with another in terms of the average of departments, then in the final analysis it is probably true to say, that at the end of the day, in general terms, you would probably find that, not to put too fine a point on it, there probably wasn't very much in it one way or the other... As far as one can see. At this stage.
Duo Maxwell: [On suffocation] Oh, this is such a lame way to die. This is so not cool!
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