The Labour party includes an interesting proposal in it’s new manifesto, it’s a plan to test migrant workers on their knowledge of the English language before they are able to work in a governmental call centre (or is that center?). Presently teachers, police officers and doctors have to pass a language test and under a new Labour government this would be extended to include other public sector workers such as nurses, social workers and various other roles. But what standards should we expect?
Running a quality telephone answering service we already feel the need to test our call handling agents on their spoken and written English language skills during the recruitment process. Ironically some of the worst candidates are UK educated who have English as their native language! However we have to accept that English is the world’s language and it is a “living” language constantly evolving and inventing new words and phrases that are acceptable to one group and frowned upon by another set of people.
So if public sector workers are to be tested for their language skills who should set the standards and what should those standards be? Should I be “sniffy” when I read color not colour, program not programme , gray not grey? Is the future a English institution (or is that an English institution?) to protect “English” English in the same way as the French have L’Académie Francaise? Is it acceptable for the spelling to be poor if the message is clear?
by Steve West
Marketing & Business Development Manager
[...] call handling agents have a broad mix of accents, ages, sex and race. As mentioned in a previous blog, what is important is the ability to speak clearly, professionally and have a broad understanding [...]