Plain English awards 2014

These awards are for the clearest documents of the year (on any subject).

Below are the winners for 2014

NSPCC

• Handle with care – A guide to keeping your baby safe
• Simple conversations to keep your child safe from abuse

These clever, clear booklets are excellent guides for keeping children safe. They are easy to read, informative and superbly laid out. The subject matter is far from easy and the NSPCC deserve a lot of credit for making this issue much more approachable than might’ve been the case.

The Motor Neurone Disease Association

• An easy read guide to motor neurone disease
• An introduction to motor neurone disease

The Motor Neurone Disease Association have produced two superb guides that keep strongly to our principles and provide clear and well-written information.

Macmillan Cancer Support

• Annual report and accounts

This is a colourful and well-presented report with great use of white space and clear, well-placed text.

Steven Poole

• Who Touched Base in My Thought Shower? A Treasury of Unbearable Office Jargon

'If modern office jargon makes you want to throw up, this book is for you.' It was definitely for us and we’re delighted to award Steven Poole for his eloquent and funny attack on the kinds of nonsense that seem to flourish in far too many offices. We doubt, sadly, that those responsible for the examples ridiculed in the book will read it, but read it they should.

Five Rivers Fostering

• Children’s Guide to Fostering

An excellent, easy-to-follow guide to help children and young people understand fostering. Five Rivers deal tactfully and skilfully with a potentially difficult subject. The guide uses accessible, well-considered, attractively laid out information.

John Lanchester

• How to Speak Money

How to Speak Money makes plenty of engaging sense out of a typically incomprehensible minefield. The book provides plenty of valuable information, laid out in an entertaining format, on every aspect of finance you previously couldn’t make head nor tail of but now can.

Plain English Standard Bearers

Winston's Wish, the charity for bereaved children, and Age UK deserve a special mention for continually reaching exceptional plain English standards. They have once again achieved the levels of clarity, attractive and accessible design and overall excellence that we now consider our benchmark. Well done to our 2014 Plain English Campaign Standard Bearers.