I like how they banned "empower" with no added explanation while the Rust team was bending backwards to argue that there is nothing wrong with the word when, in 2018, they controversially changed their motto to "A language empowering everyone to build reliable and efficient software." (https://rust-lang.org/)
Obviously gov.uk material is of a different nature than that of a corporate motto, but it speaks to the exasperate community complaints at that time.
It’s one of those words that used to have a different meaning but then a bunch of people started using it “wrong”, which is annoying to some people. It used to connote a legal or other official authority to do something.
Kinda like how some people don’t like hearing that their plane will be taking off “momentarily” or when people use “begs the question” to mean “raises the question”
It has become a buzzword. Sprinkle it in your text (along with "experiences", "embrace", "diverse", "engagement" etc.) and your text will be hard to argue against. Words are weapons. Just like you have to sprinkle "democracy" and "peace" in statements when you start wars as a country.
Rust's developers are mostly very left-wing and are, in my view, over-eager to imprint their views on societal power imbalance on their technical project, the Rust language. They hint not too subtly that before them systems programming was the preserve of forthright white guys and that they're breaking that hegemony.
Obviously gov.uk material is of a different nature than that of a corporate motto, but it speaks to the exasperate community complaints at that time.