The term "human resources" has been denounced for putting people on a par with paperclips and bulldozers.

General Sir Mike Jackson, former chief of the general staff, told 200 HR specialists in Kent yesterday that he did not like the expression.

The keynote speaker at the Kent HR Conference in Ashford International Hotel said: "At the risk of being thrown out on my ear, human resources is a strange term. It implies that a person is no more important than a paperclip or a bulldozer. I have difficulty with that because the people side is at the heart of any organisation.

"There is or can be a temptation to regard HR - what used to be called "personnel" - as a separate function from mainstream management. The two should be hand-in-hand and not parked off to that separate island called HR.

The conference featured workshops and a succession of expert speakers, including Adrian Gilpin, Tunbridge Wells-based chairman of the Institute of Human Development. The event was organised by the KM Group and Kent County Council.