In some light relief during these dark days of Brexit, let's give it up for interior designer and socialite Nicky Haslam, who has rekindled the good old British class war.

Well, not the class war as such; but Mr Haslam (Nicholas Ponsonby Haslam, to give him his full title) has decreed what constitutes "common" in this day and age.

And I'm delighted to discover that, if his rules are to be applied, I'm only a bit common, rather than common as muck.

Being declared "common" was a fate worse than death when I was growing up in Ulverston.

Among other things in the town of quaint cobbles, it was considered common to: eat in the street, drink tea from a saucer, belch in public, and go to Walter Wilson's/Fred Preston's kiosk with rollers in your hair.

Apart from eating in the street — Chippy Bank chips were always too irresistible to last the journey home — I spent my formative years avoiding the stigma of being common.

So what, according to Nicky Haslam's guide (immortalised on a tea towel — how vulgar) is to be considered common in our millennial society?

I somewhat reluctantly find I'm with him on a number of things.

These include cushions with "Love" written on them, making guests take off their shoes (my absolute all-time pet hate — it's abominably rude), self-pity, "mindfulness", exclamation marks (too right!), rinsing fruit, Bono, saying "Bon appetit", central heating, wine collecting (just drink the stuff, for goodness' sake) and coloured wellies.

Of course, the whole "common" thing is nothing new. Ever since Nancy Mitford categorised people as U (upper class) or non-U, debate has raged about the commonness of saying toilet, serviette, longer and settee — everyday words that most of us true northerners are perfectly happy to use.

If its deemed common to be punctual (which, apparently, it is) and to say "bless you" when someone sneezes (which I do), then so be it.

Personally, I think it's rude to turn up late to appointments, but then what do I, a working-class northerner know about such things?

I imagine that the well-connected Mr Haslam finds many northern peculiarities horribly common. I wonder what he would make of chips and curry sauce, for example? He'd probably need reviving with smelling salts at the very thought of pie and peas.

But that's very much his loss. We flat-vowelled sitters on settees and users of toilets might well be common as muck but I reckon that "common" people tend to be far more genuine and down to earth than those who fret about the naffness or otherwise of signet rings and conservatories.

So let's embrace our lack of style/class whatever and rejoice in being thoroughly, gloriously common. Nicky Haslam's absolutely bang on about Bono, though.