The Passive

The passive is a technique which is used to make language sound more natural. There are many different explanations and reasons some of which are clearer than others.

1. The object is more important than the subject.
2. The person doing the action is obvious or unknown.
3. We have just been introduced to the object and wish to continue talking about the object. (also described as newer information being added to the end of sentences)

An easy way to tell if a sentence should be active or passive is to decide whether the thing/person at the front of the sentence is doing or receiving the verb

If the person/thing doing the verb is first then it is a normal active sentence

'The boy kicked the football'


If the person/thing receiving the verb is first then it is passive

'The football was kicked by the boy'


Note that if we want to say who did the action in a passive sentence we use 'by', if we want to say how we use 'with'.

'The nail was hit with a hammer'


If you want to make an active sentence passive then it is quite easy

'The boy kicked the football' 


In this sentence the (main) verb (kicked) is in the past simple tense. The main verb always goes to 3rd form (past participle)

And now the magic which makes it really really easy. The verb 'be' takes the form of the original verb. So whatever happened to the original verb happens to 'be'. Here it is easy 'kicked' is past simple so the past tense of 'be' is 'was' (were) So

'The football was kicked (by the boy)'


It doesn't matter how complicated the original sentence is - use the same formula.

This time next week the government will be increasing taxes

Taxes will be being increased by the government this time next week