ANOTHER VOICE
The following clichés must be avoided (like the plague)
MATTHEW PARRIS
Another autumn, another Queen's Speech looms. As my 11th year of parlia- mentary sketchwriting begins, tolerance is wearing thin. How much more political Cliché can this sketchwriter take? Though I graze only on the lower slopes of informa- tion technology, I am considering the design of a software package for MPs. Could a programme be created which flashes a cliché warning onto the screen whenever the fin- gers at the keyboard stray into stale prose? If anybody says 'package of measures' again, I shall scream. `No return to Tory boom and bust' should be met with gunfire. The next Conservative who refers to the 'dead hand of socialism' should be birched. Even to whisper 'the many not the few' should be an imprisonable offence. As for the Third Way, the democratic deficit, the Politics of inclusion, the Tories' golden eco- nomic legacy and Labour's 'mess we inher- ited', I hesitate between a simple on-screen Warning and a small electric shock deliv- ered to the typist's fingertips. Do these people have tin ears? How can ialnyone write or say 'hearts and minds'? As :-Iler MP drafts his Commons contribution, When will the Rt Hon. gentleman come Clean with the House' and tell us — yes or no? — whether the Government will 'put in Place' the 'whole range of initiatives' for Which 'Middle England' is 'crying out' — njer ('broadly') the 'weeks and months 'eat'', does no small voice whisper, 'Stop'? Every Hansard yields its crop — no, I beg r°u, not 'bitter harvest'. Before being gged to death a verbal formulation may °lice have been striking. The 'moral high _ground', when first 'staked out', may have sounded an interesting destination, but any Politician lazy enough to invoke it today Probably isn't on it. The minister who dertakes to 'explore every avenue' is no Venturer all avenues — of appeal, of ssibilirY, of opportunity — should, like ane road to recovery, the path to progress sa d the innumerable dead ends and cul-de- (lees °lir parliamentary navigators seem to ,„ scrY, be 'closed off — along with auwPtions' of every kind — or 'stripped junaY'. Let the big beasts of the political thjle find other ball parks in which to fly 71.,1 kites — and keep off the grass roots. wilt lie e scenery sounds so exotic: a place the re knives are out and there is blood on the carPet, where, indoors, in a dialogue of deaf and the purblind too) the eco- nomics of the madhouse rules, while out- side a cascade of wealth — not to speak of the trickle-down effect — beckons from the broad, sunlit uplands. What a scenario! Or doomsday scenario. Or worst-case scenario.
And then there are the cycles. Apart from the ever-present economic cycle, there are the cycle of despair and the cycle of deprivation. Why should they cycle rather than cartwheel, slide, skate or slith- er? If not cycling we are spiralling. There's the downward spiral, the spiral of decline and the spiralling national debt. Spirals cycle, and cycles spiral, towards black holes. These should not be confused with vicious circles and virtuous circles, nor with the poverty trap (or 'targeting' the needy, which means the same thing).
The way out of the poverty trap is by 'a hand up, not a hand-out', on a raft of pro- posals or a range of measures, or a whole range of measures. Or initiatives. You can cycle or you can drive as you 'visit' and 'revisit' an argument. Increasingly MPs and their schemes are 'driven' by this or that imperative. Driven by shared values and the search for 'excellence', it is now possi- ble to revisit your working assumptions on a daily basis. But take care you don't ride roughshod over our hard-pressed teachers who have already been salami-sliced at the chalk-face. That would be obscene. Noth- ing in politics is ever disagreeable: it is obscene — or gut-wrenching'. People no longer have beliefs, ideals or principles, but 'values'. Last week I heard values distin- guished from 'personal morality': the Gov- ernment's 'new emphasis' on family is 'driv- en' by 'values', not 'personal morality'.
My computer can search Hansard and count the use of phrases up to 500, after which it stops counting. By the early Nineties (starting from 1988) packages of measures, including an increasing number of comprehensive packages of measures, rain down on all sides. By 1995, hit by the 500th package of measures, my computer admits defeat. There had also been 99 ranges of initiatives including numerous whole ranges. Many of these packages and whole ranges were 'piloted' (164 mentions); there were over 500 'pilot' schemes. 'Pilot- ing excellence' would be a good conference slogan for the Nineties. There have been only 29 more ranges since 1995: a declining instance which, along with the gradual sinking of the raft of proposals, can (I suspect) be put down to the rise of a new conveyance: the 'integrat- ed' strategy or policy. Since 1995 there have been 87 sightings of an integrated transport strategy alone. Nobody has yet recom- mended a disintegrated one. And just as there are few simple proofs — while 'proofs positive' abound — so things are more like- ly to be 'clear beyond peradventure' than just clear. What is a peradventure?
Beyond Westminster, the people whom politicians like to describe as being 'out there' have opinions. Within, they are 'of the opinion'. Out there I say. Inside I have to say—may I say? — can I just say? — if I may say so. And MPs 'hear what you say'; they never don't hear what you say. And only at Westminster, where every argument is 'rehearsed', do people 'resile' from things.
Meanwhile, pilots multiply. 142 more have turned up since 1995. As the Home Secretary said last Monday, 'With regard to piloting in rural areas, we have sought to distribute the pilots around rural areas, as well as urban areas and inner-city areas. Pilots are taking place on various subjects in Devon, Gloucestershire, Northampton- shire and in north Staffordshire.' If you see a pilot taking place, ring Mr Straw so he can add it to his list.
Although some clichés are linked to only one side of the House, most are used as a sort of joint currency by all sides, lending weight to my theory that politicians are really all on the same side. True, for the last 18 months it has been almost exclusive- ly Labour MPs who have been 'taking no lectures' from Hon. gentlemen opposite, who have 'the gall' to 'carp' — which is 'a bit rich, coming from . . . 'etc; but 18 years ago it was the Tories who were using this.
If Tony Blair had not thought of 'czars', Michael Howard would have. Every MP wants to be pro-active rather than just active. No politician is capable of saying 'billion' normally — all hit the bit with the b in it so hard that billion becomes a sort of ritual expectoration. And on all sides the response to every question — the question- er being unwilling to address it — begins with, 'What I will say is. .
Truly, we need a more pro-active app- roach to Commons cliché. We need zero tolerance of cliché. We need a Cliché Czar.
Matthew Parris is parliamentary sketchwriter and columnist of the Times.
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