As the traditional advice for children goes, if there is one thing worse than being teased, it’s being ignored. Jeremy Paxman, an expert in the oft-practised art of baiting the Scots, has finally come out with the most hurtful insult of all – he’s simply not bothered about them.

The Newsnight presenter has declared that if the Scots decide to become independent, the English will be largely unmoved and uninterested.

Contributing to a BBC One Scotland documentary What Do the English Really Think of the Scots?, to be broadcast next Tuesday, he says that Scots should “snap out of” the idea that people in England are worried about a parting of the ways.

He likened the move towards separation to watching a marriage of friends decay.

Talking to Hardeep Singh Kohli, the Scots-Asian presenter of the programme, Paxman said: “I think the view down here would be ‘if our friends in Scotland decide they don’t want the Union to continue any longer, well that is a judgment for them’. And if they really don’t want to be sharing the same house with us, and want to move out, well that’s a bit of a shame. It is like watching a marriage decay among friends.

“But if that’s what they want, well, let them do it. You really ought to snap out of this sense that everyone down here is worried about it. They are not. The English have been allowed no voice in this.”

Paxman has form when it comes to cross-Border relationships. He once claimed that it was “tremendously good fun winding Scots up” because it was so easy. He was criticised for calling John Reid, the former Home Secretary, an “attack dog” and accused him of going “doolally”over the remark.

Singh Kholi said: “My lasting impression of the words of Jeremy Paxman is that he doesn’t understand why the Scots are so obsessed with how the English feel about them and why we keep going on about it.”

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