Those readers who glance over these pages will, by now, be in no doubt as to our disdain for some press releases.
To be clear, these are press releases, you know, meant for the press. That means journalists by and large, and moreover journalists who have got used to PR people littering releases with terms such as ‘groundbreaking’, ‘world first’, ‘innovative’ and so on.
So DESNZ provides a lot of news on Government policies, it is a source of information. Yes, that’s right, information. As opposed to political slogans. And here we are taking about everyone’s favourite unknown quantity Great British Energy.
So, to the release, and why it is so bad: Energy Secretary Ed Miliband has set out his vision for Great British Energy, the UK’s publicly-owned clean power company. Okay, so far so good.
The release promises to then to set out the objectives for GB Energy. Then doesn’t.
Nope, not all, all we get is vague waffle on how it will support skilled jobs, create economic growth, provide free fluffy unicorns to everyone and help protect British billpayers – without any detail, plan or idea. You can call this a list of “strategic priorities” if you like, or a wish list otherwise.
But wait! “Working people and communities will be at the heart of the company’s work, with an aim to increase public ownership in clean energy and back British supply chains.” So that’s alright then, now it’s perfectly clear. And it gets to mention “working people” – whatever that actually means. Possibly anyone not taxed, as there was once a promise not to raise tax on “working people”.
Got it now, it’s not any detail of HOW this might work, it’s Energy Secretary Ed Miliband detailing “his expectations for how the UK’s publicly-owned clean power company will deliver.” So not a vision for the entity, a vision on the ideas of the expectations.
But it is okay, because it will “put working people and communities at the heart of the clean energy transition”. Think that’s the third mention of that elusive group now. And "heart" a nice emotive word twice.
Energy Secretary Ed Miliband said: “working people, communities and British industries at its core, turbocharging clean energy across the country as part of our clean power mission.”
Bingo! Fourth mention of working people, and by the way, how can you ‘turbocharge’ clean energy? You sort of need an ICE for that.
It’s not that the concept is bad, but this journalist really feels like a press release ought to contain solid information, data and dates, not buzzwords.
There, I feel better for getting that off my chest.
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