Blairites jump on the Blairwagon

As the parties battle it out in the final week of the election campaign, dictionary compilers have found that Mr Blair has inspired…

As the parties battle it out in the final week of the election campaign, dictionary compilers have found that Mr Blair has inspired 30 words in the English language, outspeaking Tory leader Mr William Hague, who has managed to inspire six.

The Prime Minister has sired the well-known noun Blairism and adjective Blairite as well as Blairisation - loosely meaning the swing of a traditionally leftish party towards the right, Collins Dictionaries lexicographers said yesterday.

He is also godfather to what Collins feel is "one of the most remarkable compound adjectives of recent invention" - Mandelblairian, as in "the premillennial Mandelblairian London".

If he is accompanied by some female Labour MPs, they are known as his Blairbabes, or if his children join him, they are his Blairlings.

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Other phrases coined in relation to Mr Blair are Blairski, Blairwaves, The Great Blairo, Blairforce One and Blairometer.

But Mr William Hague has managed to coin only Hagueism and Haguette - the next generation of Tory MPs - and Hagueite(s).