Words of the week

IT would be amazing. It would be good if I could get the word ‘Sir’ on my passport. It might get me through passport control quicker. There have got to be some perks. – Olympic champion Mo Farah on the possibility that he might be knighted.

THERE are too many people in a tiny country. There are classrooms of 40 kids, the NHS is in the toilet, the education system is in the toilet. I say take care of your own people first. – X Factor judge Sharon Osbourne on England.

THE North of England is its own country in all but name. Perhaps it is time to cut loose. Anyone for Nexit? – Lord (Melvyn) Bragg.

ASTONISHINGLY dysfunctional. – Former Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls’s description of Labour’s 2015 general election campaign.

TO think, Angela, if things had turned out differently, this could all have been yours. – What David Cameron reportedly said in a reference to the Second World War to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, when the pair walked together in the Buckinghamshire countryside.

LOTS of human nookie goes on in the book, but I was almost more fascinated by the equine nookie. – Writer Jilly Cooper on her new novel Mount!.

LEMON curd. You think it’s sweet, but it’s got a hefty after-twang. – Actress Tamsin Greig when asked what flavour she would like to be if she were a jelly.

I’M a husband and father first. At the end of the day, family comes first. – Jason Gillespie on why he’s stepping down as Yorkshire coach to return to his native Australia.

WHO wants to be called ‘mature’ like an old cheese? We all know that ‘mature’ means on the verge of incontinence, idiocy and peevish valetudinarianism. – Broadcaster Jeremy Paxman, complaining that in some quarters the over-50s are regarded as “virtual corpses”.

YES, but what did it lead to? It led to seven husbands, which I think would have been very tiring. – Lib Dem grandee Shirley Williams who was 13 when she lost out to Elizabeth Taylor in auditions for the film National Velvet.