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An Australian airline has reportedly issued guidelines advising employees not to "manterrupt" women and to use gender-neutral language.

Qantas airline released the information on its corporate intranet as part of its "Spirit of Inclusion" month detailing a list of potentially offensive terms.

Staff were also allegedly advised to avoid words such as "mum" and "dad" and "husband" and "wife" as they could be seen to exclude same-sex couples and single parent families.

Employees were also recommended to "minimise manterruptions" in which men in the workplace "interrupt or speak over women" and to avoid words like "love, honey and darling."

The advice was leaked to the Sydney publication The Daily Telegraph.

According to the newspaper, the intranet page read: “Language can make groups of people invisible. For example, the use of the term chairman can reinforce the idea that leaders are always men.”

One section apparently urged staff to “recognise reality” and suggested that staff describe the arrival of the British in the continent from the late 1700s as “colonisation”, “occupation” or “invasion.”

It explains: “Describing the arrival of the Europeans as a ‘settlement’ is a view of Australian history from the perspective of England rather than Australia.”

Tony Abbott, former Prime Minister of Australia told 2GB Radio that he thought the pack was ”political correctness gone too far.”

“Qantas staff are very good people… they’ve got to deal with just about every possible type of person, and they don’t need this kind of nonsense, they really don’t,” he added.

But others praised the airline for its inclusive policies.

Catherine Gillespie wrote on twitter: “Congratulations @Qantas information pack marking the start of the #qantas Spirit of Inclusion month. Everyone has the right to a work environment free of harassment and offence. Please use the same inclusive language with customers too”

Lisa Annese, from the Diversity Council of Australia which helped to design the guidelines, told The Australian: “I really give credit to Qantas who do a lot of work to make their employees feel included and valued and respected, especially now when we’re seeing stories of bad behaviour.”

The Standard has reached out to Qantas for further comment.