When was the last time you took a casserole round to a sick neighbour?

Have you ever put the dustbin back for the old lady down the road, fed next door’s rabbit while they were away, or jump-started the car on an icy morning for the family opposite?

Unless you live in the 1950s, or on Ramsay Street, you’ve probably never done any of the above.

According to a new survey, fewer people are looking out for their neighbours. More than half those surveyed by Nissan Cared4 said they wouldn’t ask a neighbour for anything, while 70 per cent admitted they didn’t know any of their neighbours’ names. Only six per cent felt a strong sense of community.

There was a time when you could walk down a typical British street and find women nattering over the garden fence, putting the world to rights and speculating on gentleman callers at No 52, while their children raced in and out of each other’s houses.

When I was a nipper, our neighbourhood was populated with ‘aunties’; a pool of mothers who formed a hub of support and friendship. I seemed to spend as much time in their homes as I did in my own.

Then there were curtain-twitchers like my grandma, who knew the movements of everyone on her little street.

But, like hairnets, short trousers and scrubbing the front step, those days belong to the past.

I’m ashamed to say I know very little about my neighbours. I became friends with my next-door-neighbour, but she moved and I can count on the fingers of one hand how many times I’ve spoken to the family living there now.

I live in a flat and seem to be first out of the building in the morning and last back in the evening, so I hardly ever see my neighbours. I do my share of putting the bins out and cleaning communal areas, but whenever I pass someone on the stairs the conversation rarely extends beyond ‘hi’.

Maybe I keep them at arm’s length because I’ve had bad neighbours in the past, not least a man I once lived next to who beat his wife and dog.

But I’ve also had lovely ones, like the one who used to mow my lawn. And one of the nicest people I know is a great neighbour, and friend, to my family.

We live in an age of frenzied global communication, be it through text, e-mail or online networking, yet we often lose sight of the people on our doorstep.

Good neighbours can be a lifeline, and should be cherished. Maybe it’s time for me to make that casserole.