british banned words

Friday, March 20, 2009

Tyler Cowen (via MissMarketCrash) gives us words that have evidently been banned by the British local government authorities:

across-the-piece, actioned, advocate, agencies, ambassador, area based, area focused, autonomous, baseline, beacon, benchmarking, best practice, blue sky thinking, bottom-up, CAAs, can do culture, capabilities, capacity, capacity building, cascading, cautiously welcome, challenge, champion, citizen empowerment, client, cohesive communities, cohesiveness, collaboration, commissioning, community engagement, compact, conditionality, consensual, contestability, contextual, core developments, core message, core principles, core value, coterminosity, coterminous, cross-cutting, cross-fertilization, customer, democratic legitimacy, democratic mandate, dialogue, direction of travel, distorts spending priorities, double devolution, downstream, early win, edge-fit, embedded, empowerment, enabler, engagement, engaging users, enhance, evidence base, exemplar, external challenge, facilitate, fast-track, flex, flexibilities and freedoms, framework, fulcrum, functionality, funding streams, gateway review, going forward, good practice, governance, holistic, holistic governance, horizon scanning, improvement levers, incentivising, income streams, indicators, initiative, innovative capacity, inspectorates, interdepartmental, interface, iteration, joined up, joint working, LAAs, Level playing field, lever, leverage, localities, lowlights, MAAs, mainstreaming, management capacity, meaningful consultation, meaningful dialogue, mechanisms, menu of options, multi-agency, multidisciplinary, municipalities, network model, normalising, outcomes, output, outsourced, overarching, paradigm, parameter, participatory, partnership working, partnerships, pathfinder, peer challenge, performance network, place shaping, pooled budgets, pooled resources, pooled risk, populace, potentialities, practitioners, predictors of beaconicity, preventative services, prioritization, priority, proactive, process driven, procure, procurement, promulgate, proportionality, protocol, provider vehicles, quantum, quick hit, quick win, rationalisation, rebaselining, reconfigured, resource allocation, revenue streams, risk based, robust, scaled-back, scoping, sector wise, seedbed, self-aggrandizement, service users, shared priority, shell developments, signpost, single conversations, single point of contact, situational, slippage, social contracts, social exclusion, spacial, stakeholder, step change, strategic, strategic priorities, streamlined, sub-regional, subsidiarity, sustainable, sustainable communities, symposium, systematics, taxonomy, tested for soundness, thematic, thinking outside of the box, third sector, toolkit, top-down, trajectory, tranche, transactional, transformational, transparency, upstream, upward trend, utilise, value-added, visionary, welcome, wellbeing, worklessness.

This is even more ridiculous than LSSU's banned words, and I doubt it'll be long before many--probably most--are rescinded.

It's unbearably difficult to keep a useful word down.