Northerners are twice as likely to take family meals together as those in the South, a survey of 3,000 adults for satellite channel Gold has found. Six out of ten families in the North claim to sit together for family meals at least three times a week, while fewer than a third in the South do.

We're also almost exactly twice as likely to get along with family members, with 33 per cent of Scots and Northerners claiming they never have family feuds, compared to 15 per cent of Southerners. Two thirds of us spent the festive season with extended family, whereas fewer than half in the South did.

Sadly, some of the good things we enjoy in Yorkshire and the whole of the North are not enjoyed by all: London families are the most unhappy in Britain, with one in five people not liking or respecting either their parents or their siblings.

But it's in one of the average Yorkshire person's most cherished self-beliefs that we're falling short. The folk of Yorkshire and Humber are famed for being direct but it turns out that we may not be as straightforward as people think, with 41 per cent believing that a strategically placed fib doesn't hurt here and there. However, if we do stretch the truth it will be for a good reason, as 36 per cent believe that sometimes you have to lie to avoid upsetting people.

Yet the same survey found that, rather than Yorkshire people, it was the inhabitants of the West Midlands who are the most honest and straight-talking in the country, where 79 per cent of those surveyed pride themselves on upholding the principle that honesty is the best policy.

But 45 per cent confess that they have upset others in the past because of their candour. Wales came bottom of the 'honesty league', with only 66 per cent saying they always told the truth and 45 per cent admitting they'd upset someone by telling the truth.