Are you in line with current investment procedure?
'WHEN I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in a rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less."That quote, from Alice Through the Looking Glass, has to be one of my favourites.
'WHEN I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in a rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less."
That quote, from Alice Through the Looking Glass, has to be one of my favourites. I think of it just about every time I read press releases from local authorities, the NHS, large corporations - any number of powerful organisations.
And it sprung to mind when I came across this sentence in a press statement from Anglian Water, answering my queries about North Walsham's flooding problems:
'If any further works are identified we will put them forward for remedial action in line with our current investment procedure.'
You may also want to watch:
Now what, exactly, does that mean? Does it say they will spend money putting things right if they find anything wrong? Nope - merely that they will 'put them forward' for action.
And what on earth does 'in line with our current investment procedure,' mean?
Most Read
- 1 Town leaves Christmas lights on throughout January
- 2 Armed police detain man after 18 hours of negotiations
- 3 Covid rips through care homes again with deaths almost doubling in a week
- 4 Egg and Spud Man's delivery service booms in lockdown
- 5 Cliff fall warning issued for North Norfolk ahead of Storm Christoph
- 6 Gresham's School to erect 25 blue plaques for famous former pupils
- 7 Where the pines meet the sea on the north Norfolk coast
- 8 Road in north Norfolk village shut due to leaking water main
- 9 Councillor asks people to speak up after confronting lockdown rule breakers
- 10 Family butcher and livestock market operator dies aged 74
Is AW saying it is investing, or plans to invest, in North Walsham? Nope - it's a slippery, vague little phrase which I just can't pin down. Would any of you care to decipher it for me?
�On the subject of words and their modern usage, let me tell you about an email I got from a north Norfolk care home before Christmas.
They asked if I'd come and take a picture of their 'service users' who had packed shoeboxes with gifts for needy children. I imagine they were referring to their elderly residents.
And a while back I passed the Big Lottery machine in Sainsbury's which had a message on it from Camelot, apologising that it wasn't working due to a 'network communications issue'.
To borrow a Little Britain catchphrase, I think that's a verbose way of saying: 'Computer says 'no''.
