THE boss of Lush has explained why the company chose words from Winston Churchill as a pro-European Union message on its shop windows.

The Poole-based cosmetics giant recently displayed a lengthy quote from the wartime prime minister.

In the passage, Churchill voiced hopes that people would think of being European as they would “belonging to their native land”.

Lush chief executive Mark Constantine has been a vocal critic of Brexit. The company employs more than 1,000 people in its Poole factory and says half of all job applicants are from overseas.

Mr Constantine said the quote had been chosen as a reminder of why the EU was created.

The words chosen were from a speech Churchill made in Amsterdam. He said: “We hope to see a Europe where men of every country will think of being a European as of belonging to their native land, and that without losing any of their love and loyalty of their birthplace.

“We hope that wherever they go in this wide domain, to which we set no limits in the European continent, they will truly feel, ‘Here I am at home. I am a citizen of this country too. Let us meet together. Let us work together. Let us do our utmost – all that is in us – for the good of all.’“How simple it would all be, how crowned with blessings for all of us if that could ever come, especially for the children and young men and women now growing up in this tortured world. How proud we should all be if we had played any useful part in bringing that great day to come.”

Mr Constantine said: “We chose the quote because we felt it reminded all of us why the idea of a European Union was first suggested.

“At the end of World War Two, when people had lived through deaths, bombings, nationalism, and the persecution of a whole religious group, leaders realised that collaboration and unity was the answer to those problems. All leaders and nations had to rise above their war behaviour, come together and create something better.

“We feel those same things are applicable today.”

The Lush campaign was criticised in Bristol, where the Bristol People of Colour Collective called Churchill a war criminal and white supremacist.

Mr Constantine said: “We are sorry that it has caused offence to some. The campaign is now over and the quote is no longer in our shop windows”.