Few things have the ability to raise our hackles quite so much as the state of modern manners. Writer, comedian and broadcaster Simon Fanshaw tells Nick Morrison why manners matter - but why it's no good looking to the past for comfort.

IF you've ever held the door open for someone only to see them pass through without so much as a by-your-leave, or if someone's bumped into you in the street and walked off with never a backward glance, or you've been forced to listen to loud mobile phone conversations on the train, then chances are you count yourself among the dwindling number of people for whom manners matter.

From shop assistants who continue their chatter while you're waiting to be served, to drivers who think nothing of stealing your parking space, it's not hard to believe we're being submerged under a tide of rudeness. In a society where everyone is out for themselves, good manners are taken as a sign of weakness, and politeness more scorned than admired.

But all those who can only feebly scowl at the everyday discourtesy of modern life can now at least take comfort in the fact they have a champion, in the form of writer, broadcaster and Perrier Award-winning comedian Simon Fanshawe.

Following the publication of his first book, The Done Thing, earlier this year, the former That's Life regular has found himself at the vanguard of the fight to restore manners to their rightful place in our lives, making frequent appearances in newspaper columns and radio phone-ins. And tonight, he brings his campaign to Durham, as part of the city's literature festival.

He was moved to write The Done Thing, an exploration of the history and evolution of manners, as well as a guide through the etiquette minefield, because he was "fed up with opening doors for people who don't say 'thank you very much',", but as he embarked on his research found that ideas about behaviour are remarkably similar across different times and different cultures.

"For example, when you look at why we teach children about table manners, the actual rules that we teach them, like don't eat with your mouth open, are quite specific to our time. We have a taboo about bodily functions and these are probably connected to our notions of health," he says.

"But that is not the most important thing about saying to your children don't eat with your mouth open. The most important thing is that you are teaching your child to be social, you're teaching them to be with other people."

And those who dismiss manners as the frivolous concern of a minority should take note of the response to public bad manners.

"The most complained about advert on TV ever, with 1,700 complaints, was the Kentucky Fried Chicken advert featuring women in a call centre talking with their mouths full. It wasn't to do with sex and violence, it was about manners," he says.

"It was young parents, saying they're trying to teach table manners to their kids and this doesn't help."

Far from being an optional extra, manners play a crucial part in giving us rules of behaviour. And it is when society is beset by doubts that we look to these rules for help.

"Since the war, we've overthrown a lot of the old deferences," Fanshawe argues. "Women no longer do what men tell them, children are no longer beaten into submission, we no longer tug our forelocks at the Royal Family.

"The old forms of authority, man, the monarchy and the Maker, have lost our confidence to a certain extent, we don't know who to respect any longer. But people want a framework, they want rules, and that is why people are talking about manners."

Manners are not about which way to hold a knife or which way to pass the port, he says. What is important is not whether the port goes to the left, but that everyone understands which way it goes so everyone gets a chance to fill their glass. The importance of manners lies in providing the boundaries of our everyday exchanges.

"Manners are about how we encounter strangers and the reason we turn to manners is because we want to have some framework where there is a sense of mutual respect and ease, and that makes life easier to get on with," he says.

"We want predictable ways of behaving. It is not about changing the world, it is about giving us some sort of structure. People today talk about the absolute bloody rudeness of living. There is casual rudeness and it seems to dominate our lives - we just don't like it when we encounter it.

"It doesn't matter if it is a chav going down the pavement on his skateboard or a middle class parent in their 4x4 driving down the middle of the road, these are rude people and when you encounter rudeness it totally occupies your line of sight."

Those who believe that young people are the worst offenders are wide of the mark, he says, just as those who believe manners are in decline are missing the point. A nostalgic hankering for the days when men tipped their hats to the womenfolk runs up against the appalling treatment meted out to black immigrants in the 1950s, and while we may learn about manners from our parents, older people can be just as rude as teenagers.

He concedes that the question of whether manners are in decline is a vexed one, but argues that the solution is not to hark back to the past but to find new ways of living together.

"I do think we have become more selfish, and I'm concerned about the way we treat each other in public spaces," he says. "We saw the difference between football and cricket this summer with Wayne Rooney mockingly clapping the referee, and the way the cricketers respect the umpires.

"The game of life, as much as cricket, can only be played when you respect the rules. Wayne Rooney chases profits around the field, and as long as that is more important than the referee, he will always respond like that, no matter how many anger management courses he goes on."

But while governments can introduce anti-social behaviour orders to regulate the more extreme end of the spectrum, if we want manners to improve it is no use just clucking disapprovingly, we have to take a stand ourselves. Whether it is asking someone not to conduct their phone conversation so loudly, or to take their feet off a chair, we need to do our bit.

"We need to have the confidence to challenge behaviour, not on a stuffy old fart basis but on a good basis," he says. "There is nothing wrong with putting your feet up if you have taken your shoes off, or you have made sure they're clean, but if they're dirty they're going to make the clothes of the next person to sit there dirty.

"We have got to find ways of providing frameworks, and the government can't do it. In the end it comes down to us."

* Simon Fanshawe is appearing at the Gala Theatre, Durham, at 7.30pm tonight as part of the Durham Literature Festival. Tickets are £10 and £6 concessions. For more details of this year's festival, see www.durhamliteraturefestival.org