Catie Holdridge
Finally, a House of Commons report that is a cause for celebration.
This is Bad Language: the Use and Abuse of Official Language – the result of an investigation into the many ways in which politicians and civil servants may baffle and intimidate readers with their use of jargon-heavy, euphemism-filled waffle. By making such official documents virtually unreadable, the report points out, the public is effectively denied access to political policies that affect them.
The committee behind the report are planning to crack down on perpetrators by issuing penalties for instances where poor use of language has damaging results, like a person failing to receive benefits or services they are entitled to.
And while their plan is to refer to the offence of bad political language by the rather jargon-y term ‘maladministration’, we really can’t do anything but applaud these announcements.
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