Jim Hacker considers cancelling the Trident programme after discovering some interesting facts about the UK's defence system.
Jim is coached in the world of show business as he prepares to address the nation on his defence policy.
Jim favors abolishing smoking through heavy taxation but runs into strong opposition from the tobacco lobby and the Treasury department.
Office politics take precedence over national issues when Sir Humphrey and Bernard fall out with each other after Jim tries to restrict Sir Humphrey's access to No 10.
Sir Humphrey tries to get his scheduled pay raise even though increases for MPs have been put on hold for budgetary reasons.
Jim must take action to avert a Marxist takeover of a Commonwealth island nation despite the efforts of the Foreign Office to keep him ignorant.
Jim has to choose a new bishop but doesn't like either the Church or Sir Humphrey's choices.
Hacker threatens to place Sir Humphrey on leave while a security inquiry looks into why he cleared a confessed Soviet spy many years earlier, so Sir Humphrey retaliates with a dog in distress on Salisbury plain.
Sir Humphrey makes Jim suspicious of the Minister of Employment when he needs the PM's support in opposing a plan to shift military personnel from the south to the north of England.
Jim considers approving the publication of his predecessor's memoirs, but it becomes a plumber's nightmare as a series of leaks spring up.
Jim uses the occasion of his predecessor's state funeral to negotiate with the French over the conditions of the channel tunnel.
Hacker and Sir Humphrey clash over the appointment of the governor of the Bank of England and the cover up of a banking scandal in the City.
Sir Humphrey makes a very strange ally out of the formidable Agnes Moorhouse, a radical political reformer from a London council, in his efforts to stop Hacker's plans to make local government more democratic.
Sir Humphrey works against Hacker over the issues of funding the National Theatre when the PM asks for help containing criticism from the Theatre's director.
Sir Humphrey faces a conflict of interest when Hacker devises a plan to improve educational standards by abolishing the Department of Education and Science.
Sir Humphrey has to decide if he will support the PM or inform Parliament when Hacker denies knowledge of a wiretap authorized by his office without his knowledge.
