Welcome to the Ontario Today phone-in round two. Here's the latest from the head office of a certain large corporation you might have heard of:

"We have undertaken the appointment of a coordinator who will be responsible for creating the structured training program and coordinating all aspects pertaining to the program and the communications strategy designed to promote the use of the program."

Unh-huh... and this just in:

"The purpose of the study is to propose a strategy and a plan for the establishment of a user training and support solution in order to make optimum use of the program."

Now, we're professional communicators, and we have no idea what they're talking about. That real-life corporate memo is one reason the plain language movement is going strong. It's a worldwide effort to chop down the tangled overgrowth in all kinds of writing. And there have been some improvements.

This afternoon on the phone-in we want to know who's still clouding the issue with impenetrable verbiage: whether it's healthcare, education, the federal tax authorities, we want to know what you think. Who needs a lesson in plain language?

(...call-in numbers edited out...)

Who needs a lesson in plain language. My guest for this hour Michelle Black. She's with the Plain Language Association. She's in our Toronto studio. Hi Michelle.

Hi Dave.

What did you make of those examples?

Uh, well they sound a lot like some of the ones I've already brought, so I'll have to pull out a couple of others [laughs].

Well Jane Farrow's almost making a career on Workology out of this sort of thing; it's a popular feature on Workology anyway. Can you top that? I can't believe it.