Yes, Prime Minister (TV Series)

The Grand Design (1986)

Nigel Hawthorne: Sir Humphrey Appleby

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Quotes 

• Sir Humphrey : With Trident we could obliterate the whole of Eastern Europe.

  Jim Hacker : I don't want to obliterate the whole of Eastern Europe.

  Sir Humphrey : It's a deterrent.

  Jim Hacker : It's a bluff. I probably wouldn't use it.

  Sir Humphrey : Yes, but they don't know that you probably wouldn't.

  Jim Hacker : They probably do.

  Sir Humphrey : Yes, they probably know that you probably wouldn't. But they can't certainly know.

  Jim Hacker : They probably certainly know that I probably wouldn't.

  Sir Humphrey : Yes, but even though they probably certainly know that you probably wouldn't, they don't certainly know that, although you probably wouldn't, there is no probability that you certainly would.

  Jim Hacker : What?

• Jim Hacker : You know, Humphrey, I've been thinking.

  Sir Humphrey Appleby : Good.

• Sir Humphrey Appleby : Don't you believe that Great Britain should have the best?

  Jim Hacker : Yes, of course.

  Sir Humphrey Appleby : Very well, if you walked into a nuclear missile showroom you would buy Trident - it's lovely, it's elegant, it's beautiful. It is quite simply the best. And Britain should have the best. In the world of the nuclear missile it is the Saville Row suit, the Rolls Royce Corniche, the Château Lafitte 1945. It is the nuclear missile Harrods would sell you. What more can I say?

  Jim Hacker : Only that it costs £15 billion and we don't need it.

  Sir Humphrey Appleby : Well, you can say that about anything at Harrods.

• Jim Hacker : You mean the German ambassador's lunch is government business, but mine isn't?

  Sir Humphrey Appleby : That is so. Not just the German ambassador's, of course, any ambassador's.

  Jim Hacker : Fine. Bernard, get the diary. On Monday I'll have lunch with the German ambassador. On Tuesday, with the French ambassador; on Wednesday, with the American ambassador. Oh, mustn't leave out the Commonwealth; on Thursday I'll have lunch with the New Zealand High Commissioner. How many countries are there in the UN?

  Bernard Woolley : Well 158, Prime minister.

  Jim Hacker : Good. That'll take up about six months; then we'll start round again.

  Bernard Woolley : Prime Minister, you're not free to have lunch with ambassadors every day. Sometimes there will be other official lunches.

  Jim Hacker : Even better. We'll fill up the odd gaps.

  Sir Humphrey Appleby : I think that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office might have some views on that.

  Jim Hacker : Oh, why?

  Sir Humphrey Appleby : Well, they always say that one Prime Minister's lunch with an ambassador destroys two years of patient diplomacy. I'm not quite sure how they'd react to 158.

• Jim Hacker : You will agree that so far my premiership has been a great success.

  Sir Humphrey : Oh, indeed.

  Jim Hacker : Yes, and I have been asking myself: "What can I do to continue this run of success?"

  Sir Humphrey : Have you considered masterly inactivity?

  Jim Hacker : No, Humphrey. A Prime Minister must be firm.

  Sir Humphrey : Indeed. How about *firm* masterly inactivity?

• Jim Hacker : You mean there's really no way that we can't not tell them?

  Sir Humphrey Appleby : Open government, Prime Minister. Freedom of information. We should always tell the press freely and frankly anything that they could easily find out some other way.

• Jim Hacker : Nice to be able to reward one's old allies. Was Ron Jones pleased with his peerage?

  Bernard Woolley : Oh yes, Prime Minister. He said his members would be delighted.

  Jim Hacker : His members?

  Bernard Woolley : Yes, the members of his union. The National Federation...

  Jim Hacker : I didn't mean him. I meant our backbencher. I meant to give a peerage to Ron Jones, not Ron Jones. The hell!

  Bernard Woolley : If it is any consolation, Prime Minister, I gather he was awfully pleased.

  Jim Hacker : I bet he was. What are we going to do about Ron Jones's peerage. Give him one too?

  Sir Humphrey : With respect, Prime Minister, we can't send two Lord Ron Jones to the Upper House. It will look like a job lot.

  Jim Hacker : We got to give him something, I promised.

  Sir Humphrey : Well, what is he interested in? Does he watch television?

  Jim Hacker : He hasn't even got a set.

  Sir Humphrey : Fine, make him a Governor of the BBC.

• Sir Humphrey : I understand that were you to cancel Trident you would be met not by the President but by the *Vice* President.

  Jim Hacker : The *Vice* President? The *Vice* President? But even Botswana was met by the President, I saw it on TV.

• Sir Humphrey : Polaris is a ramshackle old system, the Soviets might easily develop a multi-layered ballistic missile defense system which could intercept Polaris.

  Jim Hacker : By when?

  Sir Humphrey : Well, in strategic terms, any day now.

  Jim Hacker : By what year, precisely?

  Sir Humphrey : 2020, but that's sooner than you think.