MP urged to learn city's pronunciation by expert

A speech and language therapist has encouraged Angela Rayner to educate herself on the pronunciation of Worcester after the MP struggled with the word while addressing Parliament.

The local government secretary referenced the city as "Wurchester" in her speech announcing a review of the local government reorganisation plans on Monday.

Hazel Shaw, who owns a private practice in Worcester, said it was a "brilliant example" of how speech and spelling do not always match.

But the former NHS worker said: "I think it's a case of needing to educate yourself on the area you work in."

"I think if you're going to be talking about a particular area... it should be a case of you learn how you say it," she added.

"That's what I would do because you'll blend in and people will respect what you're saying a little bit more."

She added that she had faced a similar challenge through work.

"I'm originally from Worcester but a lot of my work is in the Black Country, so it's very important to me that I learn how people in the Black Country speak versus how people in Worcester speak," Shaw said.

"When we're working with children, it's important we support them to sound like their peers, their family.

"We don't want to do elocution and make them sound different.

"So I would take pride in making sure I know the accent and how people say words in the area I work."

Shaw, who has worked in the industry since 1999, said those who were not familiar with Worcester or Worcestershire could sometimes fall into the trap of thinking they needed to pronounce every bit of the word.

"If you're unfamiliar with the area, and you're trying to work out the pronunciation from the spelling, it's really easy to get yourself in a muddle," she explained.

"In some ways, Worcestershire looks much harder to say than it actually is.

"When we're taught to read, we're taught rules about how letters relate to sounds and we learn to apply those rules when we come across unfamiliar words.

"But the problem is, the English language has a bit of a knack for breaking its own rules.

"I think Worcestershire is a brilliant example of that."

Shaw said two other examples were Malvern and Bewdley, where outsiders might try to exaggerate the 'Mal' in Malvern or the "Bew" to create "Buw" in Bewdley.

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