That’s the way to say it!

ENGLISH is one of the most languages to spell correctly.

It’s a mishmash of ancient Romanic, Germanic and Celtic languages which has changed enormously over hundreds of years.

That’s why it’s full of silent letters as well as letter combinations which have a variety of pronunciations.

And when it comes to place names in England things become even more complicated.

Most place names in Huddersfield derive from Anglo-Saxon, Norse and other ancient languages.

The names, their spellings and their resultant pronunciations have changed markedly through history so it’s no surprise that they’re not spelled as they sound.

If you’re from Huddersfield you’ll know how to say most, if not all, of these places correctly.

But you’ll wince when people from out of town mangle their pronunciation.

Slaithwaite This is probably the one that outsiders mispronounce most often.

You can call it ‘sla-wit’ or ‘slath-wait’ but never ‘slayth-wait.’

Scissett This village between Huddersfield and Wakefield has a silent letter C. It’s ‘si-set’ not ‘ski-set.’

Sowerby Bridge The first word of this town’s place name is pronounced ‘sore-bee’ not ‘sour-bee.’

Honley This is less often mispronounced but you’ve probably heard it pronounced ‘honelee.’ It’s ‘hon-lee’ by the way.

Meltham

There’s nothing melting here (apart from the occasional snow and maybe some cheese) so it’s ‘mel-tham’ not ‘melt-ham.’

Golcar Another Colne Valley village that out-oftowners get wrong. It’s ‘go-ker’ not ‘gol-car.’

Fenay Bridge This suburb of Huddersfield is pronounced ‘fenny bridge’ not ‘fen-ay bridge.’

Ovenden You pronounced this part of Halifax ‘offenden’ not ‘oven-den.’

Deighton This area of Huddersfield is pronounced ‘dee-tun’ not ‘die-tun’ and definitely not ‘dieg-tun.’

Newsome The S in Newsome, just south of Huddersfield town centre, is pronounced like a Z.

So it’s ‘new-zum’ not ‘new-sum.’ 1RW RQO\ FDQ \RX FRPPXQLFDWH ZLWK RXU XQULYDOOHG DXGLHQFH EXW \RXŬOO DOVR KDYH DFFHVV WR DQ DUUD\ RI SRZHUIXO RQOLQH DQG RȱLQH PDUNHWLQJ VROXWLRQV DOO GHVLJQHG WR KHOS \RXU EXVLQHVV JHW QRWLFHG JHW VPDUWHU DQG JHW UHVSRQVH &KDW WR XV WRGD\ DQG VHH KRZ ZH FDQ KHOS \RX GULYH \RXU EXVLQHVV IRUZDUG THERE has been a fivefold increase in visits to a website from people seeking information about pension scams, following the launch of a joint campaign by regulators.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA)’s ScamSmart website, which allows people to check pension opportunities they have been offered and find out more about avoiding scams, is being visited every 27 seconds typically.

The FCA and the Pensions Regulator (TPR) launched the joint drive to raise awareness about pension frauds in the summer.

Victims of pension scams last year lost an average of £91,000 each to fraudsters.

They reported receiving cold calls, offers of free pension reviews and promises that they would get high rates of return - all of which are key warning signs of scams.

Before the launch of the awareness drive, an average of 562 visits were being made to the ScamSmart website per day. Now an average of 3,145 visits is recorded.