You may have noticed “the retail sector” (shops to you and me) has been “elevating its pricing ecosystem” (prices are going up).
The “energy sector” is “re-gearing its budgetary performance” (electricity and gas prices are monstrous).
You might buy a tub of butter and discover there has been “proactive price consolidation” (the price has gone up by a surprising amount). At a filling station you could experience “prices unaligned with previous guidelines” (quite ridiculous rises).
When you compare this year’s shopping basket to last year you can expect: a “negative cost impact” (despite the use of “negative”, you are paying more).
Worst of all, you could come across a “building-in of resilience to long-term cost projections” (prices will never come down again).
Unfortunately, pay and pension levels are “experiencing headwinds” (they, predictably, aren’t going up).
When phoning a bank or energy company you wait in a lengthy queue because “the workforce has been re-balanced” (people have lost their jobs and the service you pay for is poorer).
I detest the English language being used to befuddle. There should be a law enforcing understandable delivery of important information. A spade is a spade. A price rise is a price rise.
I have no head for numbers. I don’t understand the difference between the Retail Price Index and the Consumer Price Index. When I hear terms like these I suspect some snake oil salesman is trying to diddle me. Often, they are!
People trying to sound clever by spouting the latest buzzwords don’t sound clever at all. The use of jargon is a sign of someone trying to pull the wool over your eyes, or pretending they are in the in-crowd.
Anyone who puts pen to paper, or opens his or her mouth, has a choice. They can communicate in a way that everyone can easily understand, or they can camouflage their meaning among weird word groupings and outlandish phrases.
I enjoy the craft of clever phraseology in fictional or descriptive writing. I admire a wide vocabulary. I am impressed by apt idiom, sharp similes, and mesmerising metaphors. But flights of flowery rhetoric are not always appropriate. When important matters are discussed, I just want the truth.
Pay heed only to journalists or broadcasters who write or speak in ordinary English.
Managers and employers who hide behind the meaningless clichés of corporate-speak cannot be trusted.
Politicians should say what they mean in simple, unvarnished terms and answer the question they were asked.
We should treasure precision – sober, sensible, understandable explanations in clear English.
When we are treated like adults – when we are told what is happening in an honest and truthful way – we can deal with whatever is coming.
Word of the week
Exordium (noun)
The beginning or introductory part. EG: “If someone tells you they will give an exordium, tell them you’d prefer they just got started.”
Read the latest Oh my word! every Saturday in The Courier. Contact me at sfinan@dctmedia.co.uk
