AUF WIEDERSEHEN, “Pet”: you were a colloquialism that some may find offensive and that meant you had to go.
The term “pet” has been ingrained in the language of the North East for generations. Indeed, since the arrival of Auf Wiedersehen, Pet on our television screens, it has been part of the national language.
But in a radical and almost certainly doomed move, Newcastle City Council has instructed its workers to refrain from addressing women in the traditional Geordie manner.
No matter that everyone grows up hearing affectionate greetings such as “Alreet, pet?” and “Howay, hinny”, a council edict has proclaimed that they are potentially patronising, sexist and insulting and should therefore be treated with as much contempt as a Sunderland fan at St James’ Park.
As a consequence, the Liberal Democrat-controlled authority now stands accused of vandalising Northumbrian culture and is under pressure to reverse its decision or face the wrath of the Geordie nation.
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The trouble stems from an equality and diversity course run by the council for its staff. Its aim is to help them to “treat people with dignity and respect”. Part of the course, a council spokesman explained, involves teaching workers “not to use colloquialisms that some may find offensive”.
“Pet” and “hinny” appear on the blacklist, alongside more universal terms, including “dear”, “love”, “darling” and “sweetheart”.
One employee described the instruction as “totally bloody crackers”. He added: “It’s like they are trying to kill the Geordie language. We’re scared to talk to anyone now.
“We’re not allowed to call women pet, hinny, dear, darling, sweetheart or love. But if you’re dealing with the elderly they have been bought up with those words all their life, and I have been brought up with my family using those words.”
From the early 1970s, television helped to spread recognition of North Eastern terms of endearment. An episode of Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? rarely passed without James Bolam’s character, Terry, addressing his friend’s girlfriend as “Thelma, pet”.
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The word gained further currency when the first series of Auf Wiedersehen, Pet — about a group of Geordie builders working in Germany — was broadcast in 1983.
More rarely heard in the North East today is “hinny”, which was first recorded in the 18th century. It is thought to be a variant of “honey”.
Language experts accused the council yesterday of mounting an assault on the Northumbrian dialect. Bill Griffiths, of the Durham and Tyneside Dialect Group, described the council’s attempt to restrict the language as “a bit tragic”.
Peter Arnold, chairman of the Northumbrian Language Society, was equally scandalised. “I’ve travelled throughout Britain and been called many things by shopkeepers and people in the street,” he said. “Each and every place has its own dialect words. It is just part of the way ordinary people speak.”
Martin Callanan, Conservative MEP for the North East, suggested that Newcastle council should have more important issues to address “than staff using friendly terms like pet”.
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“These are traditional, North East terms of affection,” he said. “I can’t believe anyone would be offended by them. It seems that the council is even more loony Left under the Lib Dems than under Labour.”
The council, after initially confirming its stance on treating people “with dignity and respect”, issued a revised statement last night. Its spokesman insisted that words such as “pet” and “hinny” had not been banned. Workers, he said, had merely been advised “that they must make a judgment before using these words”.
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SOME WORDS JUST DON’T COME EASY
Love
In 1995, Leeds City Council ordered its switchboard operators not to use the word when addressing callers
Manholes
The London Borough of Hackney banned the use of the word in 1986 on the basis that it was sexist and “an insult to women”
Dear
In the late 1990s, Kings Mill Hospital, in Sutton-in-Ashfield, Nottinghamshire, banned staff from using “dear” and other pet names when addressing patients
Hardworking
In 2000, the words “hardworking” and “enthusiastic” were banned from a Jobcentre advert in Walsall, West Midlands, in case they offended a disabled person
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Ladies
Hull City Council’s corporate equalities unit produced a list of “inappropriate language” last year which warned staff that women must never be called “ladies” and that it was equally offensive to refer to older people as “elderly” or “senior citizens”
Hen
Tesco staff in Scotland were instructed in 2001 not to use the word when speaking to women shoppers after complaints that shop assistants were becoming “too familiar” with customers