Friday 26 September 2014

Run-on sentences

The following article was written by Martin Cutts, the research director of Plain Language Commission (http://clearest.co.uk/pages/home), and it appeared in their newsletter, Pikestaff. You can download their newsletters and free guides about plain language -- all in pdf format -- from this page: http://clearest.co.uk/pages/publications.

 
An error common in business English – but rare in professionally edited work – is the run-on sentence or comma splice, where a comma is placed between two statements that should stand alone as complete sentences. Here’s a typical example in a marketing leaflet:

Friday 11 July 2014

School buses, watch out!

71 school buses fined for flouting SC guidelines, said the headline in the Times of India. That came as a surprise to me. So, what will happen if a bus 'refuses' to pay the fine? Will it be sent to jail?

The fact is that the schools, to which those buses belonged, were fined. Similarly, if you don't pay property tax on the house that you own, you will be fined, not your house.