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Recently I’ve had several very similar conversations with women about their children. Basically they’ve been going on about the state of their teenage kids’ bedrooms and how they hate being a nag. I have two sons and so I’m more than familiar with what they are talking about. But my advice is this: operate a closed door policy. What you don’t see doesn’t get you down. Usually the women counter with worries about hygiene but I think they are overdoing it. Sure there may be mould growing on the crusts of toast, or on trainers, for that matter but it is hardly life threatening. Remember that experts are now saying that exposure to germs is important for a properly functioning immune system! Of course, if you run low on dishes, towels or whatever, because they are piling up behind closed doors, then you can always insist on a plate or mug amnesty.

The benefits of such an approach are enormous: for a start, you stop feeling like a nag. Your relationship with your children improves. Young people, rightly in my view, believe that how they keep their bedroom is their business and so always resent being nagged about complying with their parents’, usually their mother’s, standards. What’s more, letting young people decide how to keep their room encourages independence and responsibility. Eventually a messy room gets on most people’s nerves and they’ll tidy it up themselves. If they don’t then they have to live with the consequences of never being able to find anything or getting into a damp bed because of those towels that have never been hung up. Being laid-back about young folk's bedrooms doesn't mean letting go of general standards of tidiness: I would always insist on them being tidy in communal areas such as the kitchen or bathroom.

At this stage in the discussion women usually start bringing up the subject of laundry. Now this leads me to the second stage in my strategy to encourage young people to be independent: insist that they do their washing themselves. With my older son I did his washing until he was about 16 and then I started to get irritated when he complained if clothes he wanted to wear hadn’t been washed and ironed. Since I had enough going on in my life without having to anticipate the clothes he needed for his social calendar, I told him just to start doing it himself. When the younger one turned 14 he also had to do his own laundry. They weren’t greatly pleased at the time with this development but it cut down friction between us enormously and of course, freed up my time. The planet also benefited; before they did their own laundry they were always putting clothes in the basket that really didn’t need washed and could be worn again.

What’s interesting is that recently both my sons told me that they didn’t know another boy of their age (or even a girl) who did their own washing but they thought it was absolutely right for me to insist on them looking after themselves in this way. They agreed that it had made them feel more independent and that there was no reason why they should be loafing about at home while I took responsibility for their laundry – particularly when I was much busier than they were.

Behind my insistence was a strong conviction that by making them take responsibility in this way I was also helping their future relationships with girls. After all if you look at surveys of women’s attitudes to men then a big complaint women have is that men expect them to do everything in the house. Who is responsible for men’s expectations that there should be a woman looking after their needs? - mothers.

Don’t get me wrong I’m all for mothers playing an important role in children’s lives. There is plenty of scope to talk to children and support them in their lives. If anything I think many young children with working mothers don’t get enough time with them. I also think that young people’s needs for care and attention should be provided by their parents. But when young people get into their early teens they become capable of looking after themselves. And at that stage mothers need to hand over more responsibility to them. Since it is unlikely that the young person’s standards of tidiness or cleanliness will match their mothers’ it is important to back off and keep their bedroom door closed. Try it. All you have to lose is the sense of being a nag.