Basic Rules of Grammar

1. Subjects and verbs must agree in number.

The subject of a sentence is the person or thing doing the action or being described; the verb is a doing word that shows an action, an event or a state. Don’t let prepositional phrases between the subject and verb affect agreement.

Circle the subject and verb in the following sentences and make them agree in number:

Public policy on matters of health are of the highest priority.
The efficiency of Australia’s ports are vital to our economic success – Josh Frydenberg.
These are very hard calls to make as parents when health – physical and mental – are at play.
The legality of certain water governance initiatives have also been challenged in the High Court.
Ambassador Yamagami said the days of scepticism about investment from Japan was “long gone.”
The living narrative of Aboriginal nations are transmitted not only through songs but also through art.
Everyone thinks their city is cliquey, but neither Sydney nor Melbourne are / is more so than anywhere else.
The power to make laws against discrimination on the grounds of disabilities apply to state entities.
Now that this boom is fading, the structural weaknesses of the Australian economy is coming to the surface.
Does the bank, the platform business and the default super units get scooped up by rivals looking for scale?
The role of the British foreign office and the security forces in the death of Rasputin remain highly contested to this day.
The purpose of the matters being drawn to your attention are to illustrate the forensic disadvantage faced by the accused.
The traditional rule is that security for costs are not ordered against a natural person solely on the basis of impecuniosity.
The spate of new shows join a long line of projects going back to before those three shots (or was it four?) rang out in Dallas.
Removal of excess adult males to achieve a sex ratio skewed towards females result in faster breeding and population growth.
The evolution of telecommunication networks continue to surpass expectations as more agile and robust networks emerge.
It is the relative sparseness of the trees, a very un-Italian house, and a spindly wooden fence that tells us we are in rural Australia.
During the Second World War the gluttony of dealers, auction houses, museums and collectors in Western Europe were fed by a constant supply of illicit art.
There is no way you will find me in a pair of shorts or a skirt above my knee (the size of my thighs have a lot to do with that) – Lillian Saleh.
Lawyers acting for Charlotte’s father Christopher Haynes has asked that all records of the original investigation and decision be destroyed.
It is an extraordinary situation that an Australian citizen’s ability to learn the laws that govern them vary according to the state in which they live.
The net effect of these delays are that the accused has had the matter pending or, to use the colloquial expression, ‘hanging over his head,’ since January 2013.
However, the secrecy surrounding the exact workings of the Macquarie cash bonus pool make it difficult to figure out if staff will be better off than shareholders.
Police have commended NSW motorists after the number of drink driving and speeding offences on the first day of the long weekend were down compared to last year.
Within the policy, legislative and administrative framework applying in each State, the use of natural resources and land remain a matter for the owners of the land and resources.
Purchasers of lots in an unregistered strata plan argued that the area of the lots in the registered plan were materially less than the area of those lots in the draft plan attached to the contract.
He was in his private sedan, not the armoured car used for official duties, which are now standard for diplomats since the 2003 Istanbul bombing that killed the British consul-general Roger Short.
The report also says a succession of governments do not bear any responsibility, having received assurances from Defence chiefs that the frequency of deployments for special forces to Afghanistan were manageable.
The repetition of doing a certain kind of play – say Arthur Miller, with an all-white cast – again and again and again means that the only visioning that people who go to the theatre are seeing are a ‘white imagined space’.
The appearance of these distinctively peaked sarcophagi capped by thick sloping roofs – not unlike oversized loaves of bread – are a sign that we’re moving through an ancient necropolis just beyond the old town walls.
The potential losses which may be suffered by drilling contractors, whose equipment is extremely valuable, and who will commonly have large numbers of personnel on a rig or platform, is substantially larger than most contractors.

2. Indefinite pronouns are followed by a singular noun and a singular verb.

Indefinite pronouns or determiners include another, anybody/anyone, anything, each, either, enough, every one, everybody/everyone, everything, less, little, many a, much, neither, nobody/no one, nothing, one, other, somebody/someone, something.

Which shirt do you want for Christmas? Either is fine with me.

Many a man has lost his life at sea.

Neither candidate is fit for the job.

Neither of the two traffic lights is working.

Correct the number of the verb in the following sentences:

Every one of those 40 deaths were preventable.
Neither of my parents are from creative backgrounds.
Neither wife nor son were able to spend much time with Scott.
I don’t believe either of us are the sort of people who whisper behind closed doors.
In terms of objective seriousness in my view each fall below the mid-range for such an offence.
Donald Trump might have a dim view of US forces in Korea, but neither Kim Jong-Un nor Moon Jae-in appear to share his views.
Neither of you have taken any reasonable steps to bring to the Court’s attention that the Court may well have on its hands an unrepresented litigant.
Two further decisions in this context are noteworthy, although neither deal directly with the question of the relationship between s 56 of the Federal Court Act and the traditional rule.
Each of these entities were now too busy fighting wars against democracies – Hezbollah and Iran against Israel, and Russia against Ukraine – to send troops and warplanes to Assad’s aid as they did during the civil war.
While some of the comments about finality refer specifically to jury trials, it is fair to say that no court, whether the Supreme Court at divisional level, or the Court of Appeal, or, indeed, the High Court, treat the fact-finding process “as a preliminary skirmish in a battle destined to reach finality before a group of appellate judges”.

**3. Prepositions – and verbs – take an objective personal pronoun and relative pronoun rather than a subjective personal pronoun.**

Prepositions include about, above, across, after, against, among, around, behind, below, beneath, beside, between, beyond, by, despite, down, during, except, following, for, from, in, like, near, of, off, on, out of, than, through, to, toward, under, upon, with, within, without.

The subjective personal pronouns are I, he, she, we. The objective personal pronouns are me, him, her, us and the objective relative pronoun is whom.

First Person

Case	Singular	Plural
Subjective	I	we
Objective	me	us
Dependent Possessive	my	our
Independent Possessive	mine	ours

Second Person

Case	Singular	Plural
Subjective	you	you
Objective	you	you
Dependent Possessive	your	your
Independent Possessive	yours	yours

Third Person

Case	Singular	Plural
Subjective	he, she, it	they
Objective	him, her, it	them
Dependent Possessive	his, her, its	their
Independent Possessive	his, hers, its	theirs

Note: Pronouns do not take apostrophes.

Whilst the second person has lost virtually all inflections in Modern English, it is certainly inflected in the King James Bible:

Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.[1] (Subjective case, second person singular)

And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.[2] (Objective case, second person singular)

And he saith unto them, Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith?[3] (Subjective and vocative case, second person plural)

[1] Exodus 20:13-16.

[2] John 8:11.

[3] Matthew 8:26.

Circle the correct form of the pronoun in the following sentences:

For Mark and I/me, La Villa is our passion.
This took a huge toll on my family and me/I.
Let’s keep this a secret between you and I/me.
This was the divine gift bestowed upon my wife and I/me.
The history of our Otago T&MC says this about Murray and I/me.
It is now more essential than ever for he/him and Lindy to balance their schedules.
Has any threat, promise or inducement been held out to you by either James or I/me?
The sexual relationship between he/him and the complainant had begun in early 1996.
At the end of the day [petitions] have little above zero impact on the thinking of we/us senators – Bob Brown.
When you talk about Mayura Station now, you could map the best restaurants in Australia by who/whom you are supplying.
The vital role of ingredients inspired my mother and I/me to write The Thrifty Kitchen in 2009 and informed our career choices.
I snapped this caravan of camels after they had kindly ferried my travelling companions and I/me around the portion of the Arabian Desert known as Rub’ al Khali.
The Premier has always insisted that the heart of her government was to display “transparency,” the ability for we/us the people to see what they are doing and why.
It is doubtless true that ordinary citizens of Gaza, many who/of whom are fiercely opposed to Hamas and the deprivations it has caused, face a terrible predicament.
South Australia gallery exhibition partner Art Exhibitions Australia – with who/whom they collaborated for 2013’s Turner from the Tate exhibition and 2014’s Fashion Icons from the Musée des Arts Decoratifs – introduced them to the Musée d’Orsay.

4. Use the subjunctive mood to express wish or order.

You’ll be aware that verbs have tenses referring to the form of a verb indicating when an action takes place or when a condition exists. There are three basic tenses: past, present, and future.

But verbs also have moods: indicative, imperative or subjunctive. The indicative mood – the most frequently used – makes a statement or asks a question. The imperative mood expresses a command or makes a request:

Indicative mood She takes the bus home.

Imperative mood Take the bus home.

The subjunctive mood has two main uses:

(1) To state a condition or a wish that is contrary to fact.

Were she alive today, Florence Nightingale would understand the importance of data in dealing with a public health emergency.

The past subjunctive form of be is were for all persons, including the first and third person singular.

(2) To express, indirectly, a wish, order, sentiment, or judgment.

Heaven forbid Lest we forget Suffice it to say

Be that as it may If the Court please May it please the Court

The Court orders that:

The appellant have leave to file the amended notice of appeal.

The appeal be allowed.

A writ of certiorari be issued quashing the decision of the second respondent.

The first respondent pay the appellant’s costs of and incidental to the appeal.

Justice Gostencnik ruled Member Plain’s decision be quashed and the matter return to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal for determination.

Note that the subjunctive mood uses be instead of am, is, or are and drops the -s from the third person singular.

In the following passage all verbs are in the indicative mood:

Outgoing President Jokowi gifted Prabowo his eldest son as running mate, his own tacit imprimatur, and the resources of the state to lift him to victory. The quid pro quo is that Probowo honours Jokowi’s grand vision for Indonesia’s path to high income status by 2045 and continues the policies that have steered Southeast Asia’s biggest economy out of a steep pandemic-induced downturn.

The second sentence should be rewritten in the subjunctive mood as it expresses a wish or hope for a state that is not yet realised:

The quid pro quo is that Probowo honour Jokowi’s grand vision for Indonesia’s path to high income status by 2045 and continue the policies that have steered Southeast Asia’s biggest economy out of a steep pandemic-induced downturn.

5. Modifiers, especially simple modifiers – only, just, nearly, barely – should be placed next to the word they modify.

**Correct the placement of only in the following sentences:**

Treatment only took a few months.
HMS Daring, Britain’s newest destroyer, was only commissioned in 2009.
He had only been speaking with the person for about three minutes when –
Brockman was only expected to last seven years and it doubled as a testing ground for different ways of managing a mine.
The 27-year-old, who has only been out of rehab for three months, told friends
she felt she has overcome her desire to drink.

6. Avoid using double negatives

A double negative is a statement which contains two negative words. If two negatives are used in one sentence, the opposite meaning may be conveyed.

Correct the following sentence to convey the intended meaning:

“Adult Crime, Adult Time puts the rights of victims first. No victim’s life should not be worth less than another simply because the offender is a youth.”