‘Yes Minister’ actor Derek Fowlds dies at 82

Derek Fowlds, the star of Yes Minister, has died at the age of 82, his family said last night.

The actor was best known for playing private secretary Bernard Woolley in the sitcom and its sequel Yes, Prime Minister, as well as for his role in the police drama Heartbeat.

He died at Royal United Hospitals Bath yesterday after suffering from pneumonia caused by sepsis.

The death of Derek Fowlds will come as a great sadness to those, including myself, who loved, and still love, Yes Minister and Yes, Prime Minister.

As Bernard, private secretary to Minister Jim Hacker, Fowlds was the meat in the sandwich between the minister and the permanent secretary, Sir Humphrey. Fowlds had exactly the right blend of ingenuousness and innocence for the part. I particularly relish his answer when asked by Jim Hacker: “When the chips are down, Bernard, whose side are you on – mine or Sir Humphrey’s?” Bernard gave the classically true answer for any civil servant worth his salt: “Minister, my job is to make sure that the chips stay up.”

Yes Minister and Yes, Prime Minister were both a blessing and a curse for the Civil Service, in which I served when the programmes were at the height of their popularity. They were a blessing because they were both affectionate and hilariously funny. They captured the essential tension between the permanent civil servant and the transient minister – the latter determined to make his name by eye-catching and popular initiatives, the former out to preserve the status quo and to make sure that established applecarts were not upset.

Yet the programmes also had their downside for the civil service. They were so realistic that audiences – and in particular novice ministers – thought they were true. Politicians really came to suspect that civil servants would do their best to stymie their initiatives and, if the minister could not detect or counter obstruction by the Civil Service, it was because civil servants were so ingenious in their deviousness.

It is well known that Yes Minister was Margaret Thatcher’s favourite television programme. She took the boxed sets to Chequers and watched them over Christmas holidays. I remember more than one occasion on which, as private secretary or Cabinet Secretary, I had to caution or try to dissuade her from some reckless course and she would say: “Robin, this is just like a scene from Yes Minister.” She was right. It was.

Margaret Thatcher asked me to help the writers of the programme, Tony Jay and Jonathan Lynn, when it was migrating from Yes Minister to Yes, Prime Minister. This included giving them a conducted tour around 10 Downing Street. As a result I got to know the two authors. I also met Paul Eddington and Nigel Hawthorne but, because both died earlier, I came to know Derek Fowlds best of the three. Over the years I have done one or two gigs on the theme of Yes Minister with both Jonathan and Derek. I enjoyed them enormously and I believe that they did too. From different sides of the fence we all had exquisitely happy memories of the series.

Lord Butler of Brockwell served as Private Secretary or Cabinet Secretary to five Prime Ministers