Is there a more ‘British’ phrase than “Due to the inclement weather…”?

I love it.  Even if it invariably concludes with the announcement of some kind of train delay or discomfort.  “Due to the inclement weather…” never fails to bring a smile to my face.

But, I am also struck by what a difficult phrase it is, particularly for international visitors.

To begin, ‘due to’ is quite a complicated phrase.  It carries with it a bit of linguistic baggage.  ‘Due to’ is a prepositional phrase.  Some strict grammarians will insist that you shouldn’t start a sentence with a preposition.  More, ‘Due to’ is an adjectival prepositional phrase and, as such, should always be used in conjunction with a noun.  Perhaps in more common conversational parlance is the term ‘because of’, which has a similar meaning, but ‘because of’ is an adverbial prepositional phrase it should be used in conjunction with a verb.

Throw in historical debates regarding ‘Owing to’ into this same arena, and it would be understandable if some students of English Language are left scratching their heads.

Then there is the word ‘inclement’.  It is not the most obvious term that any student is going to learn to describe bad weather. ‘Cold’, ‘wet’, ‘rainy’, ‘stormy’: any one of them must be ahead of it in a list of useful English vocabulary.

And, finally, the word ‘weather’. Stereotypically, the British obsession.

Put it all together, and what do you get?  Confusion and incomprehension, but also one of the most evocative phrases in the English language.

© Simon Turner-Tree

Simon Turner-Tree tries to look on the bright side of his latest train-delay.