Judge: Plain Language Champion — Best Individual or Team

Writer and plain language advocate, Australia

After careers in government and the media, Neil James worked as a freelance writer and editor before specialising in plain English. He co-founded Plain English Foundation in Australia in 2003 and served as its Executive Director for more than 20 years, building it into the largest plain language enterprise in Australia before his retirement in 2022.

Neil has a doctorate in English from the University of Sydney. He has published 2 books: Modern Manglish (Scribe, 2012) and Writing at Work (Allen and Unwin, 2007) and more than 100 articles and essays on literature and language.

Neil remains active in plain language internationally. He was founding Chair of the International Plain Language Federation (2008-2015) and served as Chair of the Federation’s Certification Committee in 2021-22 before returning as overall Federation Chair in 2023-24. He has also served as a Board member and President of the Plain Language Association International (2015-17) and editor of the PLAIN e-journal (2018-20). He was awarded PLAIN’s Christine Mowat Award in 2019. He is currently Co-convenor of the Plain Language Working Group at Standards Australia.

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