Past newsletters 2002
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Plain English update 26 April 2002
The hunt for a land where the Gobbledygook Monster is extinct may be over. According to a Dutch linguist, a tribe in South America is incapable of ambiguity.
Around 2200 people in Suriname and neighbouring Brazil speak the Trio dialect. According to Dr Eithne Carlin: 'Trio leaves no room for doubt. Whoever says 'The man has gone to town', must indicate in the form of the verb whether or not he saw the man going to town. If the speaker was not an eyewitness, he also needs to indicate whether he has understood this to be the case or whether he has indirect evidence. In the majority of other languages such precision is only possible by means of long clauses, such as in the jargon of lawyers.'
The Consumers Association has highlighted some of the ways in which food and drink manufacturers stretch labelling laws to their very limits. The dubious claims included:
- a brand of 'Butter Puffs' biscuits that contained no butter;
- a packet of 'Lites' crisps containing 22% fat; and
- a 'Pure Juice Cranberry with Grape and Apple' which had 50% grape, 28% apple and just 22% cranberry.
Plain English Campaign is involved in the Clear Labelling Task Force, a government body to make suggestions on the issue. Earlier this year the group produced a series of guidelines for manufacturers.
There's a new buzzword for business executives keen to rewrite the grammar books according to Michael Spapinker at the Financial Times.
He wrote this week of chief executives promising to 'grow the firm', or economists wanting to 'grow the economy'. He describes it as a sloppy phrase disguising sloppy thinking; it isn't clear if 'growing a firm' means increasing staff levels, sales or profits.
And while Mr Spapinker acknowledges that the public decides which words survive, he points to previous words that didn't survive the public's taste test. They include 'cubliclise' (to fit with cubicles), 'dedirt' (clean) and 'underground' as a verb (to bury cables).
The Parliamentary quote of the week comes courtesy of the Guardian's Simon Hoggart, who was baffled to hear education secretary Estelle Morris say 'We are delivering objectives. There already is excellence within the sector, and we want to build on that best practice.'
'Educational questions is a monthly feast of jargon,' wrote Mr Hoggart. 'Now and again I would close my eyes to detect, if I could, some plain English. There wasn't much.'
Small print is a problem in all walks of life, but for one industry it could have particularly dangerous consequences.
Air traffic controllers at a new £623 million centre in Swanwick, Hampshire, have complained that the text on their computer screens is too small. Controllers have particular problems telling the numbers 0, 6 and 8 apart.
A Health and Safety Executive report says the text is 'at the limits of readability.'
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Plain English update 19 April 2002
The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has released its latest report into the Unfair Contract Terms regulations. In the three months covered by the report the OFT ordered 37 firms to rewrite contract terms that were not in plain language.
Some of the changes included:
- clearly numbering paragraphs to make a contract clearer;
- explaining what legal rights the customer had, rather than merely writing 'your statutory rights are not affected';
- removing or rewriting legalese such as 'irrevocably indemnify' and 'tort'; and
- explaining unfamiliar phrases such as 'injury to the boat'.
The OFT also dealt with a phone company that had a clause giving them the right to insist customers spend at least a certain amount each month. The phone company agreed to print this clause in bold to make sure customers did not overlook such an important term.
We have a challenge from the peerage this week. During a debate on a proposed law, Lord Dixon-Smith read a baffling piece of drafting.
'There are some subsequent qualifications which finish, in subsection (4), with the words:
"Without prejudice to the generality of any power conferred apart from this section, the provision falling within subsection (3) that may be made by any such regulations, terms and conditions or arrangements as are mentioned in that subsection."
'Put that into plain English if you can!'
Any takers?
Our favourite example of gobbledygook sent to us this week comes from a patent application involving a container.
The person making the application had tried to cover any legal loopholes by referring to 'a simple container in which objects are deposited.'
The lawyer involved wasn't happy with this. Instead he suggested 'a receptacle having at least one exterior surface and a plurality of walls defining a discrete object receiving volume.'
If anybody has a container without an exterior surface, we would love to see it. Please send it on the inside of a postcard to the usual address.
Some bad news from the United States this week. It appears White House officials have adopted a policy of 'correcting' President George Bush's speeches when they print transcripts.
Our Foot in Mouth award category will be a lot duller without such candidates as 'It would be a mistake for the United States Senate to allow any kind of human cloning to come out of that chamber' and 'The power that be, well most of the power that be, sits right here.'
Also in the United States, a food company is facing a heavy price for a mistake on its food labelling. A fault on new machinery meant packaging on 'Pirate's Booty corn puffs' listed 2.5 grams of fat, when the correct figure was 8.5 grams.
A New York dieter is now suing the manufacturers for 34 million pounds, claiming that the mistake had caused her to eat large amount of the snack, leaving her 'fat and upset'.
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Plain English update 12 April 2002
Our worldwide battle against jargon will reach new territory next week as two 'ambassadors' from Plain English Campaign visit Moscow. This will be the first such visit by a plain-language group.
George Maher and John Wild will speak at a major journalism and linguistics conference organised by Moscow State University. Plain English Campaign is funding the entire trip as part of our campaigning work, using money raised by the Campaign's commercial editing and training services.
George Maher said the principles of plain English applied worldwide. 'No matter what language they speak, we find people in every country need crystal-clear information. With Russia now having more and more dealings with business in the English-speaking world, we think this is an ideal chance to share our experiences in fighting gobbledygook.
'We also hope the trip will be a chance for us to learn the specific problems Russians have with unclear language, and the way they deal with these problems. Journalists translate official information into plain language every day, so this conference is a great opportunity to find out what is really happening with jargon and waffle overseas.
Conference head Professor Yassen Zasursky, dean of Moscow State University's journalism faculty, said Plain English Campaign's involvement 'will be a valuable contribution towards a cooperation between scientists and journalists of different countries.'
Founded in 1775, Moscow State University is the oldest university in Russia. The journalism faculty has more than 200 staff and 2200 students. Around 15,000 graduates now work in the media industry.
A trip to India in 1998 proved so successful that Professor Sukanta Chaudhuri of Jadavpur University described the Campaign as 'the best thing to have come our way from England since parliamentary democracy and leavened bread.'
Those of you who have found our guide to producing easy to use websites useful may find the following pages useful.
They cover some specific hints and tips on designing web pages for people with dyslexia, though the suggested techniques will help accessibility for most visitors.
Now and again we come across writing that is short, simple, straightforward... and still baffling. Peter Mandelson's 1998 Golden Bull Award winner 'Non hours work: The hours of non hours work worked by a worker' is a classic example. This week we found a somewhat baffling case in Swindon, where the council's chief education officer wrote to headteachers and chairs of governors.
'...it is clear to me that our historic practices of 'being helpful' have sometimes led to confusion about 'doing things properly'. As a result, many schools are no longer clear about what is and what isn't the proper way of doing things.'
Indeed.
One headteacher said more than 20 colleagues had called him to see if he could explain the letter. As you may have guessed, the letter referred to a specific case but the writer did not want to give details that might identify anybody involved.
Unfortunately the headteachers not involved in the case might be wondering if 'being helpful' is a euphemism in the sense of the gangster that offers 'protection' to local businesses!
Thank you to everyone who responded to our question about dates for a training course in Edinburgh. We have now confirmed an open course at the Thistle Hotel on Thursday 19 September.
We finish with the quote of the week from Councillor Alex Bovill of Grimsby Council. He spoke after reading a document from North East Lincolnshire education authority which included jargon such as 'Fulfil the stated intentions of the EMTAG Action Plan EMGV to monitor the attainment of ethnic minority pupils as an aid to raising standards. Collect data information of ethnic minority pupils KS2, KS3 and GSCE, Statistics Officer EDO, EMA Strategy.'
'I like to be challenged,' said Councillor Bovill, 'but not battered.'
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Plain English update 5 April 2002
Since our piece a couple of weeks ago about 'semiopathy' (the science of misinterpreting signs) we've had many examples sent to us. Our favourite so far is the suggestion that we shouldn't be too impressed by an estate agent offering to 'Sell your house for ninety-nine pounds'.
It wasn't until we went back to the original newspaper article describing the increasing frequency of such signs that we noticed another potential mix-up. The headline to the story read 'Laughs as idiot signs rocket'.
A clever in-joke by the newspaper or a quirk of fate? We'll let you be the judge.
Several journalists contacted us this week after the Government unveiled a series of roadside signs reading 'Don't drive tired'.
While some linguistic experts concentrated on the grammatical failings of this statement, we were more concerned with its effects. As our spokesman John Lister said 'There is a danger drivers will perform a mental 'double-take' when the see the sign and realise it doesn't quite scan correctly. This may only take half a second, but at high speeds a half-second lapse of concentration could be dangerous.'
We also explained how road signs were once written in block capitals but are now printed in sentence case so that drivers can read them more quickly.
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has made several rulings that relate to potential misinterpretation of words and phrases.
Several weeks ago the ASA decided that the phrase 'number one' when describing a firm had to refer to market share rather than service quality.
The ASA have now applied this rule to another case where a firm claimed to be the 'number one' in its field because it was the oldest firm still trading.
In another case, bosses of the Heathrow Express service (a train that runs from Heathrow airport to central London) were told to withdraw their offer of a '15 minute journey every 15 minutes' after complaints that the service did not run through the night and that the journey sometimes took up to 25 minutes. Heathrow Express is now searching for an advertising firm to find a better phrase to describe their service.
And catalogue shopping company Argos got a ticking-off for a cheeky defence of the term 'Britain's brightest prices'. After complaints that other firms offered the same products for less, Argos claimed that 'brightest' did not mean cheapest, and was merely 'puffery'. The ASA disagreed and told them to amend the claim in future to avoid any confusion.
The Financial Services Authority (FSA), the Government's financial watchdog, is asking for examples of misleading marketing leaflets and booklets.
The FSA will gather together the complaints to produce general statistics on the types of problems consumers face with terms and conditions. However, they will not be publishing the names or details of any of the offending firms.
You can report any financial gobbledygook to the FSA by calling 0845 606 1234. If you do make any complaints, please send us a copy as well. We are always looking for current examples as ammunition for our campaigning. And unlike the FSA, we're not afraid to name and shame the offenders.
The Crystal Mark scheme hit another milestone this week with the 7000th document to earn our approval. The logo went to the British Heart Foundation for their 'Living with heart failure' booklet.
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