Bertie and the Kinky Politician (9 page)

‘Nothing new about that,' snorted Chaplain, his beatific smile wreathed in cigarette smoke.

‘I thought Denmark quite competent.'

‘He was. Disappointingly righteous as well. We didn't really have anything to use against him and I wasn't at all happy about that, but I suspected he'd resign so we've killed many birds with just one accurately aimed stone. This new guy's equally virginal, but at least he's spectacularly lacking in experience so I confidently predict he'll be far too busy to notice us. However, just for my own satisfaction, I want you and Greg to keep an eye on our Mr Timbrill. Do the usual digging.'

‘How deep?'

Chaplain leaned back in his chair again, unconsciously exposing his soiled tie. The stain fascinated Pritchard. It was a mystery to him how a man possessing so magnificent an intellect could manage to miss his lips with such astonishing regularity.

‘Just have a nose around. Use the van, but I'm confident Captain Dull is incapable of harbouring anything damaging and since there are other more pressing demands on our services, I don't want to waste too much energy in that direction.' He nodded at a tiny data stick on his desk. ‘That's the official record. I've added a few notes of my own at the back.'

‘Sure.' Pritchard was halfway through the door when Hugo called him back. ‘You might like to start in Greenwich.'

‘Oh?'

‘It's all in the file.'

James staggered into Angela's office on gelatine legs. There was no doubt his overall state of mind could best be described as confused. She stared at him with a concerned expression on her face. ‘You OK?'

‘Do I look OK?'

‘No, can't say as you do.'

‘Then I'm not. Want to know what happened?'

‘You got the sack.'

‘Your frankness is refreshing, but entirely inaccurate. Try again.'

‘Well, with the others gone, you must now be the Secretary of State.'

James collapsed in a chair and smiled wryly. You had to get up early to beat Angela. Her analytical skills were faultless. ‘I note you're using the exact same tone of disbelief as I did.'

‘Mr Timbrill, may I be honest?'

‘Go ahead, and for God's sake call me James. I could do with talking to a person who has a grip on reality.'

‘Why on earth did you accept? You're not cut out for this kind of pressure.'

‘I was given little choice.' James paused, frowning as he recalled the interview. ‘Actually, I was given no choice at all. The PM expressed his complete confidence in me.'

‘He would have to.'

‘Thank you, Angela.' James enjoyed her sarcasm and decided to tell her straight away. He had an embryonic plan forming in his head and wanted to hear her opinion. ‘Since I am now in charge, I'm going to do something no one has anticipated.'

‘Invade Poland?'

‘Sorry, but some painter with a major personality disorder beat me to it.' He liked her spontaneous humour. ‘No, what I was going to say is that firstly, I want you to move with me.'

There was a stunned silence. ‘Me? But I'm not qualified to be a Parliamentary Private Secretary.'

‘You are now. Call it a battlefield promotion.'

‘Well, OK, thank you. You'll need all the support you can get if you're going to take on that lot.' She waved dismissively in the general direction of the upper floors, areas brimming with staff whose actual function seemed to be unknown but whose job descriptions inevitably incorporated the word ‘secretary'. Frankly, there were more secretaries in the building than soldiers; Private Secretaries, Principal Private Secretaries, Under Secretaries, Assistant Secretaries and Assistant Under-Secretaries. There were legions of Deputy Secretaries, Deputy Under-Secretaries, Permanent Under-Secretaries, Parliamentary Private Secretaries, Parliamentary Under-Secretaries and Parliamentary Private Under-Secretaries. Rumour had it there was, somewhere in the vast building, a Permanent Principal Private Parliamentary Deputy Assistant Under-Secretary, but the unfortunate who held the post had long since been crushed under the weight of his ID badge.

All James needed was an honest-to-God, down-to-earth, tell-it-how-it-is, no-nonsense, politically incorrect secretary. One who could type. Like Angela, for instance.

‘Like I said, leave it to me. I'm in charge now, although it pains me to say it.' He leaned forward, suddenly serious. ‘Listen, I know why I got the job. If it's obvious to you I'm fairly useless then it's certainly so to Downing Street. Don't underestimate the PM. He's a shrewd man. He obviously wants a night-watchman, a nonentity who will provide a bit of stability, someone to tide them over at least until the next election. If there hadn't been an embarrassing shortage of suitable candidates I wouldn't have stood a chance, but it's too late now – the announcement's been made and they're stuck with me. He would never sack me so quickly after my appointment because that would make him look like a right donkey, so here I am in a sudden position of strength, and as well as taking you with me, I'm now going to do something entirely unexpected.'

Angela struggled. ‘What?' She just couldn't imagine James doing anything noteworthy – he was an accountant from Gloucester, for Christ's sake, a place she suspected had only just begun to enjoy the benefits of electrification!

‘The PM suggested I take a look at cutting costs. Sure, every new boy gets told the same, but he's also promised any savings we make will be ploughed back into the department and not collared by Social Security. I suspect he made his promise lightly without actually expecting to have to honour it. However, I've been given a real opportunity to achieve something in the short time that's available to me, and even though I'm likely to go down in history as one of the most ineffective ministers this century, and let's face it I'm up against some stiff competition there, I still want to achieve something. I have got a little pride, you know.'

‘So what are you going to do?'

‘Commission a review of all the associated agencies and administrative sections in the MoD, but this time to be carried out by a fully independent non-governmental inspectorate. An impartial team from the private sector. They'll have unlimited access and three months to identify the dead wood. I'll then go to the PM and insist on a great big wad of cash on top of what we can squeeze out of the ministry. If he refuses, I'll just resign. He won't want that, so the extra money should come our way.

‘My goal will be to cut all the scandalous spending on things we don't need any more. Did you know we've recently spent two million pounds on doors for this place?' he suddenly fumed, waving a hand around to signify the surrounding building. ‘That's an awful lot of bullets and boots! The forces are there to defend us and that's where the resources should be concentrated. I don't think anyone would argue with that, so I'm going to hack away at the pen-pushers and layers of pointless management. Any savings will be used to provide better equipment, training and salaries and certainly much better pensions. We'll buy a few frigates, get the shipyards going again, or something like that.'

‘And you think you'll succeed?'

‘Probably not, but I hope to expose such outrageous profligacy that whoever comes after me will have to do something. I don't care who gets upset because I haven't got a career to defend. Whatever happens, I'll be out at the next election, so what have I got to lose?'

‘A fat pension?'

‘My dear, they'll fall over themselves to give me a pension just to get rid of me.'

‘I don't believe I'm hearing this,' said Angela faintly.

‘Wake up! This is the way things are run. Politicians bide their time in ministerial posts knowing that they'll be moving on as soon as something more succulent turns up. They pick at a few problems, play the media game and swan off after a couple of years. It's the professional civil servants who actually govern each department because they represent experience and continuity. I thought everybody knew this. Our civil servants do a magnificent job but they are devious little sods when it comes to expanding their own bureaucracy – the bigger the better because it looks like they're needed.'

‘Of course everyone knows the civil servants run everything. It's just you don't hear that from anyone at Westminster.'

‘That's not the only thing you'll be hearing from me, I can assure you.' James stood up and assumed an earnest air, slipping one hand into his trousers pocket to give himself an aura of casual gravity. Angela recognised his authoritative House of Commons stance. He had become James Timbrill MP, Secretary of State for Defence, projecting the quiet confidence she knew he never felt. ‘Mr Speaker, many before me have merely tinkered before moving on, but I plan to be remembered as the first post-war minister who actually made a difference.' James paused theatrically and glared pugnaciously around an imaginary Commons. ‘Our forces will be armed to the teeth with everything from chilli-dipped suppositories to this department's weapon of choice, nuclear powered pencil sharpeners!'

‘You're bloody mad,' she giggled.

‘So was George the Third – and he had blue wee-wee.' said James, glad to see he'd managed to put a smile on her face. ‘And now I'm going to hide under my desk. Only the important calls, please.'

James couldn't settle. He sat for a few minutes, toyed with the idea of calling Celeste, then decided to freshen up and stepped into his private bathroom to rinse face and hands, but when he returned to the office an unexpected visitor loitered by the window.

‘Hello, James. I hope you don't mind me dropping in like this, but I'm rather pressed for time.' Austerly, despite the devastating events of the day, still managed to convey just a trace of supercilious arrogance. How the hell had he got past Angela?

‘Not at all.'

‘Something of a surprise, no doubt.'

James felt sufficiently vindictive enough to reinforce their dramatic change in circumstances by sitting behind his desk and deliberately closing a manila folder stamped
Restricted.
Actually, it was next week's menu, but since almost all paperwork in the department had a
Restricted
rating at the very minimum, even the menu was regarded as an official document, fully protected by the Official Secrets Act.

MoD documents are, as one would expect considering the subject matter, invariably sensitive, and this being a bureaucracy honed to perfection over many years and by two first-class, no-holds-barred world wars, there had long been an approved hierarchy of document classification. Unsurprisingly, the actual document establishing this classification remains, in itself, classified.

Firstly, at the very bottom of the pile, a few lowly documents fall into the
Unclassified
category These can be safely left on tube carriages or restaurant tables without any undue fuss. The next upward level of classification is
Restricted
, covering such important documents as the week's menu. Leave one of those on public transport and you can expect a reprimand at the very least. One above that is
Confidential
, and the inadvertent loss of a
Confidential
document in British Home Stores can put an embarrassing dent in your career. Then comes
Secret
, the spook's favourite There are two categories in this well-known classification; plain, ordinary, good old bog-standard
Secret
and the critically important For-Heaven's-Sake-Don't-Tell-The-French
Secret UK Eyes Only.
This category is normally reserved for anything the MoD wants to keep from Britain's staunchest allies. In other words, anything that's been a tad embarrassing or a bit of a cock-up.

Finally, at the top of the pile, and this is where the loss of a document can really land you in some major trouble – as in prison time – comes the infamous
STRAP
classification. STRAP is an acronym for Signature Transfer Required from Authorised Personnel. These documents come with a minder and must be signed for at all stages of use. They are never left unattended. They are never removed from the building. They are never lost or mislaid. You sign your life away when you take charge of one of these. The staff joke that STRAP documents are so called because you have to literally strap them to your body at all times.

Thankfully, the canteen menu, certainly the most carefully scrutinised document in the building, remained comfortably within the
Restricted
classification, but that didn't stop James from concealing its contents from unauthorised eyes. Austerly bridled at the unspoken insult but said nothing. James, fortified by the thought of all those missiles now under his control, gazed at the disgraced minister and waited. This should be very interesting. In what form would the bribe be offered? Would subtlety be exercised or would the man get straight to the point?

Quentin Austerly was a smooth bastard. Real smooth. Smoother than Captain Smooth of the Smooth Team at the University of Smoothness in Smoothville. He always dressed immaculately in regulation pin-stripes and waistcoat, possessed a widow's peak of very dark hair which for some inexplicable reason made him highly attractive to the opposite sex, and was as dishonest as the day was long. Essential requirements for an ambitious politician. His biggest hero was Richard Milhous Nixon.

‘So, what can I do for you, Quentin?'

Austerly chose his words carefully. ‘Firstly, despite what has happened this morning, I hope you'll remember I was always fair in our dealings. I regarded you as an equal. You are an excellent minister.'

James knew when he was being lied to – Austerly had been an abrupt prig who barely acknowledged his existence, and even when he did, was overtly rude. Well, two could play at that game. ‘Thank you, Quentin, that's refreshing to know. What about the time you made me take the train to Glasgow while you and Sharples chartered an RAF jet, you oleaginous, follically challenged knob?'