Plain English Campaign to make sense of 'garbled' Prescott

John Prescott, who is notorious for his tangled sentences, has signed up to the Plain English Campaign.

The Deputy Prime Minister will be given access to one-to-one sessions by the campaign, which offers training and advice on clear communication.

His department paid £2,000 last month to become a corporate member. The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister was unavailable for comment last night but there was speculation at Westminster that Mr Prescott's reputation for garbled sentences might have motivated the decision to join.

During the recent fire dispute observers were bemused to hear him announce: "As for the question about whether the TUC have agreement if the members of the 1978 agreement, that is a matter for the TUC and their agreement, but it is the matter for me to an agreement, as I informed the House, I did seek to find an agreement which I failed on the first occasion, dealing with this really exceptional in conflict."

The Plain English Campaign said it was delighted the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister had joined. John Lister said all members of the department, including Mr Prescott, would be welcome to attend a special training course. "Mr Prescott strikes us a great example of someone who you would think would be a natural plain speaker but he seems to be trying too hard to sound important and that's where it gets muddled up," he said. "There's no reason we couldn't look at one of his speeches. We would start by looking at the problems of gobbledegook and jargon."

Soundbite losing the thread

"The objectives remain the same and indeed it has been made clear by the Prime Minister in a speech yesterday that the objectives are clear. And the one about the removal of the Taliban is not something we have as a clear objective but it is possibly a consequence that will flow from the Taliban clearly giving protection to Bin Laden and the UN resolution made it absolutely clear that anyone that finds them in that position declares themselves an enemy and that clearly is a matter for these objectives" ­ August 2002