Bournemouth Council has voted against a motion to introduce gender-neutral language.
The motion proposed dropping masculine and feminine terms, including Chairman and Mr and Mrs, for ‘Chair’ and ‘Mx’.
Weary locals welcomed the move saying: “Some common sense at last”, but expressed amazement that the council had “wasted time and money on it”.
‘Ill-considered’
The motion was brought forward by councillor L-J Evans, who claimed that masculine and feminine terms “reinforce historic gender stereotypes”.
But fellow councillors disagreed, with one calling the proposal “ill-considered”.
Tony O’Neill added: “There are more important issues to hand.”
Pregnant ‘person’
Last month, the UK Government backtracked on referring to a pregnant woman as a ‘person’ rather than a ‘mother’ in its maternity leave Bill.
The initial wording caused uproar as MPs complained that “extreme gender ideology” was being written into law.
The Government subsequently agreed that the use of the word ‘mother’ is legally “acceptable”.
Govt agrees to call pregnant women ‘mothers’ in maternity Bill U-turn