Coronation Street hellraiser Charlie Lawson has revealed in a frank BBC documentary how he empathises with the frustrations of loyalists in Northern Ireland.

Speaking on ‘Story of a Lifetime – Charlie Lawson’, broadcast on BBC One on Wednesday night, the Ulster star revealed: “I understand why the Protestant people in every enclave feel that they’re hanging on by a thread because people at Westminster don’t give a flying **** about them.”

When asked if he would call himself a loyalist he said: “If it means that I’m loyal to the six counties of Northern Ireland and to the Crown, if that makes me a loyalist, then I’m a loyalist.”

The actor, who grew up in a middle-class home on the shores of Lough Erne in Co Fermanagh, and attended boarding school in Campbell College in Belfast where his love of drama developed, said he had “never met a Roman Catholic until I was 20”.

He said one of his first Roman Catholic friends was fellow Fermanagh actor Adrian Dunbar.

He said drama school and ‘Aidy’ collectively helped him become “a bit more of a human being because you can’t hate people and be an actor”.

He added: “It doesn’t work. It doesn’t gel.”

However, during his formative years in Belfast, Mr Lawson admits he “probably” hated Catholics.

“I didn’t know any but that’s the way you were brought up,” he said.

“I can’t remember whether I hated them but I probably did. And I was probably hated the same way.”

He said he could have become embroiled in the violence he encountered in east Belfast – but he had the opportunity to get out.

“If I’d grown up on the Newtownards Road and I was skint and my parents were skint and I was unemployed, if there were people shooting at me then I would have shot back.

“My father was threatened for years. So it’s not a big step from that to say I’ll ******* shoot back.”

In the searingly honest documentary, Mr Lawson also told Stephen Nolan about his regret at losing out on the relationship with his daughter Laura when she was only six-years-old after his first marriage broke up.

“I don’t see enough of my daughter now, I see her every couple of years,” he said.

He added: “I broke her bloody heart.”