So this is the language of Shakespeare

IS it just me or are standards in English not just falling but in free fall.

I have already had a go at the current crop of semi-literates who have come out of our education system with their goody bag of buy-one-get-one free A-levels and GCSEs who think that any plural of any word has to have an apostrophe.

But this lack of respect for what is after all our mother tongue, the basic tool of communication on which everything else is based, goes much deeper than that. For example onto is not a word, despite its regular appearance in advertisements and even newspapers, it is two words, on and to, just as alright does not exist within the English language - all right? And while we are at it, into and in to mean different things. If a magician turns in to a petrol station he has probably gone for fuel. If on the other hand he turns into a petrol station then that really is magic.

And as for text speak or whatever it is called, the language of mobile phones. When youngsters think they can even apply for jobs using a language which has all the subtlety, nuance and flow of broken lager bottles then hope is close to being abandoned.

Mind you I seem to remember that the Scottish Qualifications Authority, one of the several million quangos we seem to be lumbered with, was prepared to allow text speak in exam answers a couple of years ago as long as the answer, according to them, was correct. It is all a bit like the old Eric Morcambe line about all the right notes but not necessarily in the right order.