Mea culpa: cross words

We got into a muddle reporting on former Tory MP Aidan Burley’s move to Reform UK, the Nigel Farage vehicle. We said: “Mr Farage ... hailed the politician’s decision to cross the floor.”

Which floor? As Philip Nalpanis points out, the saying “cross the floor” refers to an MP moving across the House of Commons to take their seat on the benches opposite those they previously sat on.

Mr Burley is no longer an MP so cannot perform the physical action tied to this saying. We might argue that we had turned the literal phrase into a metaphor, but given we will need to describe a sitting MP’s defection again (who knows how soon), we would be wise to keep the link between the phrase and the action.

To reflect his decision to switch parties, Mr Burley posed for a photo with Mr Farage. A rather less dramatic act than “crossing the floor”.

Missing meaning “Woman abducted as a baby dies aged 30,” read the headline for an item in Wednesday’s Independent on the death of Abbie Humphries, who was kidnapped hours after her birth in 1994.

Readers would be forgiven for wondering what kind of life a 30-year-old infant might have led and how its death related to a woman’s abduction.

Return of an icon We said Sir Keir Starmer spoke at “the iconic Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire”.

The term “iconic” has a dishonourable history at The Independent. It was banned years ago after a time when it was the go-to (read: lazily applied) adjective for anything of note. These days we are only asked to avoid it.

It could have been avoided here. Though Pinewood Studios might be worthy of the description – it no doubt holds a special place in Britain’s film industry – Mick O’Hare points out that an icon can speak for itself. Similar to the way a famous person hardly needs to be described as “famous”. Such an economic approach helps keep our sentences lively, engaging and unburdened by cliches.

I must admit, however, that earlier this week I was drawn in by the headline of an article in our London-centric sister publication, The Standard, about the capital’s “famous” Regency Cafe. I hadn’t heard of the cafe before – I wonder if I would have read on had I not been curious to find out what made it famous.

Cut it out “Swinging cuts” made an unwelcome appearance this week in a report on the chancellor’s denial that the outcomes of her spending review would amount to austerity. Thanks to Paul Edwards for reminding us that the proper cliche is “swingeing cuts”.

“Swingeing”, a fossil word, is occasionally revived to form this phrase – it has also been known to precede “taxes”.

Take cover In a report on conditions in Taliban prisons, we included an account of a man being tortured by being ordered to stand with weights attached to his “private parts”. Mr O’Hare asks whether Independent readers need this euphemism to protect them from a specific term such as “genitals”, “penis” or “testicles”. They don’t.