Government policy policy - Yes Minister - BBC comedy

[Fordgirl]

No-one does political waffle like Sir Humphrey. Brilliant :)

[Reyfus733]

And this is how you write politics assignments at university

[lhc89]

One of my favorite scenes from Yes MInister.

[minagirlie]

Nigel Hawthorne is brilliant, this is one of my favourite moments of him :-)

[Academician100]

What episode is this?

[theshd]

Rupert Murdoch should have seen this! Even the table is the same!

[claudiusrex]

Best series ever.

[cristop5]

Now what is the message there? The message is that there are known "knowns." There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say there are things that we now know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we do not know we don't know.

[1foxtrot70]

Truely amazing!!!  I can not imagine this being done on one take...LOL! Are there any out-takes or bloopers posted for the series? Those should be just as funny as the final takes if not more so.

[eldanielfire]

@1foxtrot70

I believe that Nigel Hawthorne was able to recite and repeat every speach he did in Yes Minister.

[1foxtrot70]

@eldanielfire - truely amazing minds in these actors

[DarwynxRivver]

hahaha... i should be studying.

[1foxtrot70]

I would love to see the blooper out takes. There is no way this could be done on one take. Hmm...of course being Nigel Hawthorne it would be possible!

[mrbignose888]

I have always been amazed by the straight faces every one could keep. They must have tried most scenes several times. His sentences are so difficult AND funny at the same time. If you compare this to the things they say in comedies nowadays, this was worthy of an award.

[pspboy7]

The administration of the policy of the administration of policy, holy cow hehe.

[Boratlon]

Is Sir Humph. wearing an OW tie?

[AnnoyingTypoSyndrome]

She was lucky to get away with that.

If she had deschiphered his babble (which actually IS a well constructed sentence, and DOES mean something - just nothing different to what he first said), a policeman might have come in and bashed the shit out of her.

[sford605]

That's a stroke of genius... if they have no idea what you've said, then how can they disprove it? Sir Humphrey forever :D

[AustralianLeprechaun]

Unreal!

[dharmaseed]

That's a lot of meaningless drivel....isn't it? lmfao

[CalyxAsgard]

If it doesn't make sense, you win the arguement.

[JOHNSENA666]

i love the way the two people behing sir humphrey manage to keep straight faces

[mlovecraftr]

Sir Humphrey rules!!!

[youloveus85]

overfiend30, BBC Worldwide is the commercial arm of the BBC and receives no money through the licence fee. Further more, overseas users of the BBC News website will encounter advertising as they do not pay for a licence.

[overfiend30]

@youloveus85

Thanks, I didn't know the BBC had any commercial activities.

Still it just feels wrong watching adverts before Yes Minister somehow.

[overfiend30]

Is anyone else getting adverts before the clips? I don't think that the bbc are allowed to be connected in any way to advertising external companies. I hope they know about this.

[002Tube]

Isn't she the old rich woman from the movie "Dolores Claiborne?"

[jferkfjkj]

yes judy parfitt

[knighterrant03]

Superb - and still so relevant.

You can imagine that sort of buck passing at the expences inquiries.

[dgbaje]

I love it!

[Gaius51]

MP's should be paid more heres why in short :

1) If you pay peanuts you will get monkeys. £64K sounds like a lot but consider doctors, lawyers etc can make way more than politicians so anyone with any real talent or skill would go where the money is. Consider bankers earn millions of pounds a year and their job is to keep the bank profitable and working, if they can't fix it what chance does Jo Swinson have? Sorry am running out of letters so I will repeat it again pay peanuts you get monkeys

[flyhead2]

Ministers earn £64K and bankers millions, you say.

Who do you think really runs the country?

Your proposal would simply give us fatter monkeys.

[creigaunnalara]

The Irish PM is paid more than Obama, however his performance is less than stellar.

A case of paying well yet still winding up with apes.

[ThatIsNotDeadWhich]

There's no need to match the pay scale of City commodities traders. The British government has plenty enough Villagers without actively headhunting more parasites from the City.

That aside, the only people who mindlessly apply for the position where the salary is highest are the psychopaths. And you don't want psychopaths in government.

Sane, emotionally stable people also consider non-monetary rewards, such as the chance to shape policy and improve the lot of their fellow man.

[rc0ll]

I've heard this argument before, and the best argument against it is that if you pay politicians millions of dollars as their base salary (not including perks, indexed pensions, lifetime subsidies and so on) you'll attract the wrong kind of people in politics, those that want to screw everyone over for their own benefit. Sure that about fits the description of politicians now, but on lesser pay at least they appear idealistic.

[mlovecraftr]

@rc0ll yeah but if salaries are low it could happen that the educated professionals needed to fulfill these civil service posts drift away to the private sector. A big point of the series itself is the balance between elitist, well educated yet highly efficient civil servants and sensitive yet populist and egocentric politicians.

[trickmatt]

Love Sir Humphreys, the best!

[PortsladeBySea]

Our local MP spent £145,000 in 1 year running his office...that's what I call cutting back to help the economy!

[SlockNCFC191]

Brilliant, hilarious but sadly very accurate about politicians. If you can't answer a question, simply waffle on meaninglessly for a few minutes to make the question go away.

[BrilliantClash]

Brilliant Delivery!

[cleaverwielder]

Oh god, I can never watch this enough, "yes with pleasure"

[Asaweb]

He just described the EU system.

[helmuthoorn]

He just described the synod of the Protestant Church of the Netherlands

[adrian993]

What the gov't DECIDES to do= Policy.

Who carries out the Policy?= Civil Servants/Administrators.

Thus, Policy of Administration are the rules deciding HOW the civil servants do their jobs in carrying out policy. WHILE, Administration of Policy is just the fact that civil servants are supposed to do what the gov't decides.

Confusing because while everyone knows that gov't decides, and civil servants carry out plans...it's not so well known as to who decides on the RULES of carrying out :)

[DaniMajor]

The best thing is the smile he wears when she says:

When will this be over?

And then he with a naughty smile

"Soon as you like"

He´s brilhant!

[cleaverwielder]

classic yes minister scene, it was the scene that defined the series, this one and the scene in the polite where he and Sir Humphrey first meet "you certainly answered all my questions" "I'm glad you thought so"

[HiveMistress]

Wow! Does any1 manage 2 catch up with what he means?

[GrandMasterScotty]

Absolutely brilliant

[hirdas]

This is among the very best tv productions ever, love it.

[jcoles88]

Is there anywhere where you can watch full episodes online?

[Irisrose06]

Humphrey is an absolute star, love him! Nighel Hawthorne had waffling in an educated manner down to an art!

[ShadowWorks]

Oh these were the days!

And its basically today's government

[seasonalspeccy]

It's basically every government ever! :-)

[jamesmaxwell007]

The best tv comedy ever made!