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Proclivity for prattle under fire
City council cited as one of the worst offenders with its ‘language crimes’
FROM citizen empowerment to rebaselining, coterminous to level playing field, impenetrable jargon has long been the preserve of local authorities.
Last week the Local Government Association published a blacklist of the 200 most inscrutable terms, and Westminster City Council is cited as one of the worst language crime offenders, tallying up 170.
Phrases that would make The Office’s David Brent baulk include the dreaded “capacity building”, “evidence base”, “revenue streams” and “meaningful consultation”, all of which appear on the council’s website with reckless abandon.
Now the council’s proclivity for prattle has come under fire, with opposition leaders calling on the council to axe the gibberish.
The Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate for Westminster North, Mark Blackburn, discovered that put together, banned words occur almost 24,000 times on the council’s website.
He said: “Westminster seems addicted to gobbledygook. It’s amazing the examples of jargon were found almost 24,000 times on the council website.
“The council needs to write documents in plain English that will make sense to anyone. It’s simple. I mean, look at the examples of what council officials are writing. These are in council documents, and council documents are public documents that members of the general public should be able to get hold of, read and understand. A Liberal Democrat-controlled Westminster would discourage officials from using jargon and insist on plain English.”
Among the more challenging passages was in a planning document that read: “The City Management DPD flows from, and in many cases, adds more detail to the policies in the Core Strategy and it will set out the inter-relationship between spatial, temporal and sensory place shaping that the Core Strategy Preferred Options document highlighted.” There was also, “The LA will work with secondary schools to implement a ‘hard to place’ pupils protocol which will result in the responsibility being passed from the LA to schools with peer challenge where illegal off-rolling takes place,” in a document about schools.
The council says it is currently reviewing its website, with a view to scrapping the confusing language.
Council leader Colin Barrow said: “We of course understand that our residents want information to be as easy to read as possible and the most popular pages on our website, which include council tax, parking, rubbish collection and schools, already use straightforward everyday language. To build on this work, since October last year, we have been undertaking a major project to overhaul the council’s website to ensure all of its key content is easy and clear to read. However, the main way we communicate with our residents is through the Westminster Reporter, the council’s magazine, which is written in a simple and concise style and tells our residents about the vast array of services that are delivered across the city.
“We know that this magazine is widely read and regularly receives very positive comments from residents. In addition, we provide every single local taxpayer with an A-Z, a simple guide to all council services, which is also written in plain English and is popular with local residents.
“While no council can ever claim to be perfect, Westminster is making every effort to communicate clearly with residents wherever possible.” |
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