I seem to touch a nerve every time I use the word “separatist” to describe those people who wish to separate. [Hon. Members: “ You said ‘bitter.’”] Well there may be bitter separatists and there may be lovely, generous warm separatists—I am sure there are; perhaps I am looking at many of them now. If people are
pursuing a project so enormous that they might get offended at the word “separatist”—[Hon. Members: “You said ‘bitter!’”] Oh bitter—forgive me. In that case, so as to carry on in the right spirit I withdraw the word “bitter”. People of all temperaments who are separatists may wish to consider how they make their case, and they should not be too worried if someone refers to people who, for genuine reasons want to separate from the other countries in the Union, as “separatists”. That word has had a good outing now—hopefully, separatism and separatists will not cause such a problem now we have burst that bubble.