British judge launches scathing attack on emergency service 'management jargon' that costs lives

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"Baffling jargon used by senior 999 staff may have cost lives during the July 7 attacks on London, a senior judge said yesterday.

In a scathing attack, the coroner at the inquest into the bombings said bureaucratic language meant emergency workers had no idea what other crews were doing. The level of confusion was such that fire and ambulance teams sometimes stood doing very little while victims lay dying amid the train and bus wreckage.

Lady Justice Hallett levelled her criticism after London Fire Brigade assistant commissioner Gary Reason spoke of a ‘conference demountable unit from the management resource unit’. In plain English, that is a mobile control room.

It was the first time any senior authority has drawn a link between ‘officialese’ and the serious failure of public services to do their duty.

Lady Justice Hallett said: ‘Management jargon is taking over and perfectly sensible, straightforward titles are being changed. ‘I don’t know whether a crew manager is somebody who is responsible for supplies or is used to fighting fires. I have no idea.’

The coroner said that clarity of thought was vital during an emergency and added: ‘People at the top need to say we have to communicate with people in plain English.’

Critics say councils use overblown language to disguise non-jobs and justify excessive salaries. The emergency services have also overhauled simple words in the cause of political correctness – such as using ‘firefighter’ rather than ‘fireman’.

‘Jargon also allows unaccountable cliques to appear as if they alone have some sort of higher wisdom. The whole point of an open society is that we should be getting rid of exclusive language.’

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