WHAT’S your favourite word? That was the question answered by 50,000 people in a bid to raise funds for a children’s charity.

The results showed a real north- south divide – the most popular words in the UK were “love”, “hope” and “family” – but matters took a more colourful turn north of the border.

The Scots plumped for the word “numpty”, which means “idiot” but also describes general foolishness (eg: “that ref’s a numpty” or “politicians are nothing but a load of numpties”).

Other winning words from Scotland included “peelywally” (def: pale and sickly, as in, “he’s lookin’ awfy peelwally”) and “scunnered” (def: feel disgust or sickened, as in “we were scunnered that Scotland never made the World Cup finals again”).

The canny Scots have turned some of these words into a money-making industry, printing them, with their definitions and examples of usage, on everything from mugs and coasters to tea-towels and T-shirts.

However, my favourite from the Wall of Words challenge that raised £50,000 for the charity, I Can, is “supercaleygoballisticcelticareatrocious”, coined in the Scottish Highlands after Inverness Caledonian Thistle’s finest footballing hour – a victory over Celtic at Parkhead.

My own choice would be “pleasure”. I love it because it sounds like what it is, thanks to the rich ”shjju” sound in the middle, which is the noise I associate with a square of Galaxy chocolate melting on the tongue.

With a liberal helping of journalistic licence, I took a punt at the favourite words of some people in the news – and came up with the following: David Cameron: Swingeing (especially when applied to the word “cuts”) Nick Clegg: Chameleon (as proven by changing his political colours from yellow to blue at the first sniff of power) Peter Mandelson: Guacamole (what the “Third Man” apparently likes to have with his chips according to the urban myth when Mandy confused mushy peas for the Mexican dip while on the campaign trail in a Hartlepool chippy) Foreign words are just as intriguing. Yorkshire author Joanne Harris was in York this week to launch the Big City Read where 7,000 copies of her novel Chocolat will be given out for free.

She admits to collecting words from other cultures that don’t have an equivalent in English.

One example, from Iceland, is “man reduced to the level of a pig through drink”.

Somehow, I think the Scots might have a word for that.

THE Eighties revival looks like it’s here for a while. And no, I’m not referring to the return of leggings and jumpsuits, or the run of Ashes To Ashes on the box. No, it’s as if the clock has turned back when we see images of crumbling schools on the TV news.

We thought those days were long gone – particularly after the millions Labour spent on building new schools across the UK, not least here in York.

So you have got to feel for the teachers, pupils and parents whose dreams of moving out of temporary classrooms and away from rotting buildings into brilliant new palaces of learning have been crushed by the Con-Dem cuts.

As we enter the new age of austerity, the question they must be asking is, will their new school ever be built rather than when.

Which makes the injustice of the free schools policy all the more painful.

If there ain’t no money to fix the hole in the roof for one group of pupils, there shouldn’t be any cash to pamper the desires of well-to-do pushy parents who don’t want to send their kids to the local school.

The answer seems simple: invest in existing schools, narrow the gap between the good and the not so good – and there would be no need for these parent-powered schools which are anything but free.

Also, by investing in our existing schools, and their run-down premises, we are keeping the economy ticking over by providing work for architects and the construction trade.

If Michael Gove and his lame-dems can’t see that, they should stand in the corner and put on the ‘D’ cap.