FUDGE AND MUDGE

verbal phrase (Politics) As a political catch-phrase: to evade comment or avoid making a decision on an issue by waffling; to apply facile, ill-conceived solutions to problems while trying to appear resolved. Etymology: The verb fudge has been used since the seventeenth century in the sense 'to patch up, to make (something) look legitimate or properly done when in fact it is dishonestly touched up'; mudge here is probably chosen for its rhyme with fudge and influenced by smudge or muddle, although it might be taken from hudge-mudge, a Scottish form of hugger-mugger, a noun meaning 'disorder, confusion' but also used as an adjective in the sense 'makeshift'. History and Usage: The catch-phrase was coined by the British politician David Owen in a speech to his supporters at the Labour Party conference in 1980. In a direct attack on the leadership of James Callaghan, he said: We are fed up with fudging and mudging, with mush and slush. We need courage, conviction, and hard work. Since then it has been used in a number of political contexts, both as a verbal phrase and as a noun phrase for the policy or practice of fudging and mudging. A short term victory must poison the atmosphere in which much-needed, long-term reforms of pay bargaining are examined. There are occasions on which it is right to fudge and mudge at the margins. Guardian Weekly 14 June 1981, p. 10 Since the Prime Minister has a well-known abhorrence for fudge and mudge, it must be assumed that she agreed to this next step [in joining the European Monetary System] because she intended to take it. Guardian 28 July 1989, p. 22