IT STICKS in my throat to say that any banker is ever right but Barclays’ group chief executive Antony Jenkins is when he says ‘crucial skills’ – shaking hands, looking people in the eye – are not being taught in enough schools or at home.

These skills are the ones that make employers want to take on someone. Or not, because they feel it will all be a disaster.

They used to be universal. But now, in my experience, they seem to belong far more to kids who have been to the better schools, or had the kind of parents who have placed them at the centre of their lives.

Because I’m a conspiracy theorist I’ve always assumed that one of the big reasons for getting rid of grammar schools was because far too many kids – like my mum and dad – were breaking away from low-waged, working-class households and into a middle class where they could own their own home, get a decently-waged job and not have to skivvy for a few pennies an hour.

Grammar schools laid huge emphasis on good manners; standing up straight, minding your Ps and Qs, speaking clearly and knowing the difference between affect and effect, because these things are the mark of the well-brought-up. The kind who, for the most part, snaffle the interesting, well-paying jobs.

Whereas my own experience, helping in a young persons’ charity, has shown that many of them are seriously adrift through no fault of their own.

They’ve been allowed to believe that looking smart, tucking in your shirt, speaking well and sounding clever isn’t really important.

For years we have allowed children to mumble on in patois or text-speak, critically damaging their chances of making it in an outside world which is still run by grumpy 40 and 50-somethings who don’t want their receptionist looking like a clueless slapper, or their salesman sounding like Terry Thickwit.

I know academic standards are important but if I was a headteacher I would introduce elocution and deportment classes, plus a few lessons on what to do at interview and how to make small-talk with the outside world.

Life is so tough for young people today in ways that it wasn’t in the past.

Let’s make it easier for them by giving them the inside track on manners and correct behaviour so that they too can have a crack at achieving their dreams.