I WHOLEHEARTEDLY concur with Colin Moorcroft’s condemnation (‘Footway folly’, Letters, Daily Echo, May 25) of the increasingly common use of the absurd word “footway”, and his suggestion that it must be the creation of “some jobsworth in a department somewhere”.
But there is, unfortunately, nothing new about this nonsensical and unnecessary replacement of perfectly good English words and expressions – most notably when (driven, I’m sure by a misguided desire to ape our friends across the big pond) “personnel” and “staff” were replaced by the hideous “human resources”.
And I still remember receiving, a couple of years before I retired from the travel industry in 2018, a notification from a leading tour operator, that concluded with request that the information therein be “cascaded” to all employees. Grrrr!
Cascaded for God’s sake? What’s wrong with “passed on”?
I came to the conclusion some time ago that this nonsense does indeed emanate from empty-headed jobsworths who have far too little to do.
According to the old adage, “necessity is the mother of invention”. In these cases it is more a matter of inventing a necessity!
ROBERT READMAN
Norwich Avenue West, Bournemouth
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