Is it just me? Or have we finally remembered how to queue? asks LEAH HARDY 

Growing up in the Sixties and Seventies, queues seemed as quintessentially British as Ladybird books and fish and chips. In that orderly world, we let older people and pregnant women go first — the rest of us waited.

At bus stops, we’d arrange ourselves in a tidy line. Queues at the greengrocer and butcher were cheerful, gossipy things. Rare examples of ‘pushing in’ would be greeted by tutting tongues, until someone would point to the back of the line, saying, ‘Excuse me, the queue starts there’.

Queuing became part of the British character in the early 19th-century, when shops replaced open-air markets. It reached its apotheosis during World War II, when housewives would wait in line for hours for rationed goods.

But over the past few decades, we’ve seen a collapse in queuing. That organised line at the bus stop has morphed into a sharp-elbowed huddle. Entering a train carriage has become more ‘me first’ than ‘after you’.

But could there be change in the air? Could social distancing teach us to relearn the civilised system of queuing? We’ve got a long way to go, but today, a friend excitedly called to report that her local deli, where yummy mummies once aggressively clashed pushchairs, now operates a one-in, one-out system obeyed by everyone.

Of course, this queuing is happening for the worst of reasons — a vicious virus that is keeping us from our loved ones.

But might we, in future, maintain our polite, safe, socially-distanced spaces, curb our impatience and let vulnerable people go first?

Wouldn’t that be worth waiting for?