Learning New Rules
Characters: Bernard Woolley
Genre: General speculation
Rating: PG
Warnings: none
Summary: Pre-canon Bernard-centric fic. Bernard tells the story of his career before The Right Honourable James Hacker MP came to DAA and what his outlook on life is at the time of Open Government (at this stage, not too sarcastic).
There is the old saying that low-ranked civil servants want bribes, mid-ranked civil servants want friends and high-ranked civil servants want levers to advance their careers.
There have been temptations at certain stages in my career, I used to be in government procurement previously after all, but be it as it might, I have never ever accepted bribes and shall not do it, no matter what. It is against the rules. I love rules. Rules are logical, always tell you what to do, leave plenty of room to interpret them creatively, while you always have your behind covered nonetheless. And above all, the whole foundation of winning a game is knowing the rules.
I have never ever even been a low-ranked civil servant anyway, come to think of it, I started my career in mid-ranks. Back in the old days, when I studied in Oxford, the chicks-to-chaps ratio was about 1:10. But I got myself the prettiest chick anyway. My wife's name is Catherine. We got married right after the graduation. Most chaps would kill to have my wife. At the time we got married, Catherine's dad was in The Treasury and got her a job in The Bank of England. To be brutally honest, I got some help from my father-in-law as well, to get my foot into The Ministry of Defence.
I worked there for 13 years. First, I was responsible for procuring non-military vehicles. That mostly means buying cars for the administrative staff. I absolutely loved this job. Also, my first boss was a really nice chap. However, once he asked me to do something that is against the procurement rules. I really did not want to do this, having a creepy feeling it will be I who takes the fall for this. Somehow I managed to maneuvre out of it. This is probably the rightest thing I have ever done. A while later, strange and disturbing things happened. A bribery affair which I do not really know all details about, took place and he went down with a major scandal. Somehow I think there is more to this than meets the eye, but I cannot prove it, I have not told about it to anyone and I do not really want to talk about it.
That was the first time when I was in complete panic that I get fired. Yet, that was not the end of the story. Far from it. It was an opportunity, which I had not even dared to dream of. I was lifted up as a shining beacon of always following the rules and in a rather early age I was promoted to the position of the head of division, responsible for MOD's non-military procurements. I loved this job too, actually.
3 years ago there was a reorganization of duties and my division went under The Department of Administrative Affairs. At first I was quite depressed here, seemed to be such a dull place. I became responsible for procurements on a more massive scale, without any significant pay-rise. Things cheered up a bit when Lloyd Prichard, my best buddy from Oxford, came and asked, whether he could join the ranks of civil service. Had been a stock-broker, made some over-leveraged bets with clients' money, which resulted in huge losses, it came out and he got the boot. I inquired into this fiasco very thoroughly, and after having found out that he had not broken any rules, it was merely a failure, I gave him the green light. I managed to get him in as my assistant. I do not exactly delegate too much responsibility to him, just helps me with paperwork and managing The Urgent. But he's a fun chap and we play billiards during lunch hours. And appreciate certain finer things in life, such as birds, cars and rude jokes.
1 year ago, strange and disturbing things happened again. Sir Humphrey Appleby, my rather eccentric boss in DAA, screwed up with something. I was pressured to kill the project. I inquired into this debacle very thoroughly, and concluded that it files under „embarrassing". For an explanation: „compromising" means things that you can get fired for, if they come out, such as technical violations of rules, and „embarrassing" means things that involve no technical violations of rules, but if they come out, can make you a complete laughing stock in the eyes of higher ranks. He had given a permission to a large contract, which, as it later turned out, was not looked upon favourably in The Cabinet Office. I could wipe it under the carpet, while staying within the rules myself. And I did. I killed the project before it really started and filed all evidence among the CGSM.
Well, containing this omega level crisis opened a door for myself to move up to high ranks of civil service. So I became The Principal Private Secretary to the Minister. The pay-rise was pretty neat and I got myself a Bentley. But I do not have any grip on this job, I'm afraid. I've been in the civil service for 15 years, I'm not exactly a rookie, yet I'm confused most of the time, on what to do. In secrecy, and I do not dare to tell this to anyone, not even my wife, I am starting to wonder, whether I have been promoted above my competence level...
In procurement, everything is very simple because it means bargaining within a solid framework of rules. And many completely and thoroughly legitimate and sound a) exceptions b) ways to bend the rules c) ways to go past the rules. But even after being The Principal Private Secretary to the Minister for a year already, I'm still in the dark about the new rules. There just do not seem to be much of them. Such a mess. The only do/do-not rule I have learned so far seems to be: do what Sir Humphrey tells and do not even vaguely imply he could make any mistakes. While he is normally alright – also went to Oxford, is terribly clever and played the previous Minister for a chump completely and utterly – he may get very suddenly extremely upset over some non-event and react in irrational ways. I also do not fully understand, what to tell him about and what not. In procurement it was explicit not to waste his time with any contract under 50 mills, but now he tells he „must know everything".
Theoretically following the only do/do-not rule is manageable, also strongly advisable, but having ministers complicates it greatly, because they have their own wishes which I ought to follow at the same time. This always makes me very confused. No solid rules to that, oh Gosh...
By the way, we just got a new minister The Right Honourable James Hacker MP. I have mixed thoughts on him. On the level of first impressions, seems to be alright and have a nice easy-going personality. But the problem is, he went to LSE, you know... and let's face it, The Oxford Gentlemen such as I simply cannot and will not take this sort of crowd as serious players, ever. Together with the new Minister we also got an undesired extra, his sidekick Frank Weasel. Complete schmuck. Was prancing around in DAA, making a gravely embarrassing spectacle out of himself. As far as I have heard, those bad actors from provinces should not be allowed to interfere with government business. But strangely enough the new Minister has quite a hot wife. Don't even think about doing anything about it! It is one of those gravely unfortunate exceptions to rules, meant to be avoided at all costs. It still goes into the „embarrassing" file, where you do not technically violate any rules, it is not „compromising" as such, but you get fired for it nonetheless, also humiliated on top of that.
Those Permanent Secretaries also pull my leg whenever they can and that is most of the time. It's like I know only the rules of tennis, have a racket and no skates, while the game we are actually playing is ice-hockey. If that metaphor makes any sense. Today The Cabinet Secretary – a fellow that really should not be crossed, no matter what – made it brutally clear to me that The Open Government initiative is not even worth any debate and me daring to pose such silly questions proves just one thing: that I am a complete lunatic. Yes, well, what if I am a complete lunatic. Come to think of that retrospectively, asking silly questions always sends the higher-ups into pompeus speeches. While those speeches are quite unpleasant, I may even hear and learn something useful, which I need to know. Must investigate further.
So far my career has gone up quite exponentially. Most people tell behind my back that I am one exceptionally lucky fool who always happens to be at the right place and meet the right people. And other people call me an opportunist, occasionally into my face. There is, however, the general consensus, that I do not have any distinguishing talents and I just follow the rules. While this is not entirely incorrect, being at the right place, meeting the right people and understanding what an opportunity is, requires knowing the rules. Being the Minister's Principal Private Secretary, I have a job that most chaps would kill to have, but I don't particularly have any power as such. Because I do not know the rules. Got to know the rules. There must be rules.
FIN.