In Ukraine polling stations, where Parliamentary elections are taking place on Sunday, are called Precinct Electoral Commissions. This has an American ring calling to mind the administrative area of police stations.
Of course the origins of “precinct” go back much further. In Latin praecingere means to encircle. This is just one example of an American usage having a linguistic purity that has been lost in Britain. Another is “hustings” a word barely used here until the Conservative leadership contest but still in use in the United States and Canada. It comes from the Norse, husthing, a household assembly.
The last hustings of the leadership campaign was held at ExCel in London’s docklands on Wednesday evening. It was my first visit to ExCel. It is served by the Docklands Light Railway, small driverless trains that run every ten minutes; just right for a household assembly, less well-suited to an event attended by a Biblical five thousand. It is a large hangar not unlike the terminal at Stansted.
Let’s cut to the chase. Boris made his twelve minute address behind a podium in suit and tie. He quoted Churchill, “our darkest hour”, in a Churchillian growl – surely an act of hubris. He flourished a kipper in an act of pantomime and he delivered platitudes of the sort he writes in his newspaper columns. I was not impressed but he was cheered to the steel girders.
Jeremy wore a tie, no coat, and spoke from the stage. He kicked off with some feeble joke about choosing his campaign slogan, Has To Be Hunt. Then he got into his stride and tried to explain how he would deliver Brexit without a no deal. He didn’t dodge the fact that he had voted Remain and he did capitalise on his experience as Secretary of State for Health and now Foreign Secretary. He was well-received but Boris’s clapometer reading was higher.
I was pleased to see The Mirror chicken in attendance: “Lies will come home to roost Boris”.
