The previous chapter traced the development of the plain English movement, which arose out of the benefits perceived to arise from using plain language in legal documents. In this chapter, we consider some of those benefits in more detail.

The meaning of ‘plain English’

We begin with a point of terminology: what is meant by ‘plain English’ or ‘plain language’ in the context of legal drafting? Various terms are used to describe the modern style of legal drafting, including ‘modern English’ and ‘standard English’. ‘Plain English’ is the term that has achieved the most widespread use.

Some lawyers are reluctant to use the term ‘plain English’. They assume that it denotes an oversimplified ‘Dick and Jane’ style – that its advocates employ a debased form of language, shorn of beauty, stripped of vocabulary, truncated in form and deficient in style. This, however, is a limited understanding of the true nature of plain English. As the Law Reform Commission of Victoria pointed out in its 1986 discussion paper Legislation, Legal Rights and Plain English, ‘plain English’ is a full, adult version of the language. Documents in plain English are rightly described as simplified, in the sense of being rid of entangled and convoluted language. But ‘plain English’ is more than that: