General English Level 5 GELEV5 Unit 04 Topic 02.doc 6. Who thinks the e-business company and the banks are responsible for this crime?  a) Sophie  b) Mathew  c) Keith 7. What usually happens in this situation?  a) The bank pays back the customers.  b) The criminal is never caught.  c) The criminal manages to hide the money from the authorities. 8. What does Keith think will happen to the criminal?  a) She will be in prison for a long time.  b) She will get a short sentence.  c) She will be able to spend the money while she is in prison.  LANGUAGE FOCUS 04 Cleft sentences Mathew, Keith and Sophie say: Mathew: … it's the e-business company and the banks that should pay. Keith: ... it will be their customers who have to pay for her crime. Sophie: …but it's the woman who will really suffer. When we want to focus on (put special emphasis on) one part of the sentence (usually a noun group), we use a cleft sentence structure. Mathew could say, "The e-business company and the banks should pay." But he wants to emphasise who should pay - i.e. the e-business company and the banks (not somebody else). He says, " ... it's the e-business company and the banks that should pay." In a cleft sentence we generally use the impersonal it + the verb to be + a noun group + a relative clause. Look was Janis Steadman who stole the money. is usually the bank's customers that have to pay. It will be the criminal who suffers most. Information We can use cleft sentence structures to focus on • actions (verbs) 124 QUESTLANGUAGE