At a time when it is hard to get people to agree on barely anything, here’s a truism we can all sign up to: good manners cost nothing. You may think courtesy is over-rated, or unnecessary in a digital age, but I’m sure you can accept that there is no financial implication to saying “please” and “thank you”.

Gordon Ramsay is with me on this – he has six kids and says teaching them manners is the thing he’s most proud of as a parent. I assumed that having manners and instilling basic etiquette into all of our children was still a thing, but on an almost daily basis, I see examples that make me wonder.

I get the train to work every day, and I have sympathy for what happened to the money-saving expert (and occasional panelist) Martin Lewis recently. He was traveling with his wife and 13-year-old daughter when people on the carriage started playing videos on their phones and everyone could hear.

In those situations are the ones who don’t want to seem rude so we usually put up with it. Martin didn’t intervene until they started watching – and therefore broadcasting – a video about serial killers and he felt he needed to politely suggest they might turn it down as the content wasn’t suitable for his daughter. It is usually mortifying to be called out for being disrespectful to others, but according to Martin, one of them told him his daughter had probably “heard worse at school” and this was a “public train for heaven’s sake” -as if “public” means a free-for-all.

In the end, the volume went down and everyone was happy(ish) but Martin wondered, “which one of us is out of kilter here?” I’d argue strongly that those other passengers were. Headphone dodgers are the tip of the iceberg though.

You, like me, have probably stood in many a coffee queue and heard a customer in front ask the barista, “can I get a flat white?” I would love it if one day the response from behind the counter was, “haven’t you forgotten something?” Or when trying to get off the Tube or Metro, seeing grown men and women standing resolute in front of you, despite the station assistant begging on the intercom to “please allow passengers off the train first”.

My husband and I were hot on manners with our children as they were growing up: firm handshakes, look people in the eye, opening doors for others, letting people go first, and so on. They are house rules for everyone. We also tried to make sure, from as early as I can remember, when on playdate or at a schoolfriend’s birthday party, they must say thank you to the mum or dad as they were leaving (every parent remembers the kids who got handed a party bag and say nothing in return). On the odd early occasion when they forgot, I would end up reminding them in front of the parent  – “what do you say?” – much to their embarrassment, so funnily enough it didn’t happen very often.

And I can still remember the tense stand-off between me and my niece, who was about three at the time, as I was cutting some birthday cake. I asked her if she wanted a slice and she said yes without adding the “please” bit. I tried again and again but she wouldn’t budge and neither would I, so in the end she “won” by not being forced to say it, but she didn’t get any cake. By the way, she’s grown into the most brilliant and courteous teenager, and the “incident” has become family folklore which we love to laugh about.

I like to think we’ve set a good example to our boys, although they do get irritated even now when, after they’ve told me a story about a kindness being shown to them, I say “I hope you said thank you” – which of course they have. They have also found it funny when we send and receive thankyou cards after a party or weekend away- it’s not the cards themselves, but the fact I’ll then tap out a WhatsApp thanking them for the thankyou card. It’s a kind of virtuous circle.

Have good manners become less important or have the rules somehow changed? Is there a sense of entitlement some people feel in a public place (and I mean grown-ups too – this is not an attack on young people many of whom are beautifully courteous) – that essentially, they can behave exactly how they want and don’t need to consider others?

It may be that some parents, with the time and money pressures many are experiencing right now, find it easier to let things go. Because who wants more friction and pedantry about manners when you’ve just got home from work and you’ve got to make the tea for your hungry, tired children, supervise homework, make sure their bags are packed for the next school day, before launching into the whole bath and bed routine? But I’d argue time should be made for ensuring the next generation have good manners.

Courtesy is about showing respect for others and there may be tangible benefits to being brought up like this too. As I’ve said to both my sons, in a super competitive employment market when you’re trying to land that job, having good manners might just be the secret weapon that wins the day, whether you’re on a train or not. And it is absolutely free.