- guardian.co.uk, Thursday December 7 2000 02.07 GMT
Luton council has joined film star Alicia Silverstone in picking up a Plain English Campaign award for speaking gobbledegook.
The prizes are handed out to organisations or people that produce incomprehensible statements. This year, a record 11 "golden bull" prizes were handed out.
Luton won its prize after reportedly describing go-karting lessons for excluded children as: "A multi-agency project catering for holistic diversionary provision to young people for positive action linked to the community safety strategy and the pupil referral unit."
The actress and council join the Department for Social Security and the Ministry of Defence in the campaign's hall of shame. The MoD won the prize for a legal document that contained a single 166-word sentence.
The South West of England Regional Development Agency also took home a prize. A leaflet on the agency's regional economic strategy told readers: "Aligning the drivers, values and principles with the objectives is the key to unlocking the strategy. When they are fully aligned, they will illuminate the actions that need to be taken in the region."
Director of marketing and communications Michael Roberts said, "We accept that this award is in good nature. We take the point and we are endeavouring to make sure that our information is as readable in the future as we can possibly make it.
"Next year we're aiming to win the award for the clearest plain English and we've set up a campaign within our organisation to do this."
As for Ms Silverstone, she won the "Foot in Mouth" award for what the campaign termed "the most baffling verbal statement of the year". The actress described a film she had starred in as: "Very deep. I think it was deep in the way that it was very light. I think lightness has to come from a very deep place if it's true lightness."
