Posted 3:27 PM by Paul
Conference Speak

Today I went to a conference on training in the construction industry which was attended by a Government minister. He is an intelligent man who spoke well and it was a pleasure to hear him talking abut the value of training and self improvement for its own sake as well as the economic benefits.

The same man two years ago had banged the lectern and asserted "the age of learning for learning's sake is over!" I wish Socrates has been with me in Oldham to hear this twaddle. He may have nutted the Minister shouting "stitch that you brain dead Spartan!". However, the anti -intellectual proclamation got rapturous applause from a hall full of small businessmen.

" Don't any of these people collect stamps or read about the Zulu Wars? " I wondered to myself as I downed the third glass of free wine. But I suppose he knew what his audience wanted to here. Everything was down to the balance sheet.

But today's conference also had it's fair share of nonesense. Below are a few of the words and phrases I would either ban or tax heavily.

• It's all about partnership
• Agenda for change
• We need a step change in [ insert nonesense ]
• Engineering out the problems
• There are no easy solutions
• There are no more jobs for life [ errr. unless like me you have a safe seat in Parliament ]
• We have just set up a working party to scope out the issues

At some point in the near future a politician is going to reclaim the English language from consultant double speak and reap the reward at the ballot box.

P.S Amongst other things Alice is getting The White Stripes Live at Blackpool on DVD and tonight we talked about going to see them play live. Problem is that I would not be allowed to dance as this would be just too embarrassing.