Ha! Told you so! After years of ridicule and derision, us blokes have been vindicated. It’s official – we’re not useless around the house after all.

According to new research out this week, the claim that men are incompetent when it comes to housework is nothing more than a clichéd myth.

Gender identities expert Dr Rebecca Meisenbach, from the University of Missouri, says the idea is made up by women, to offset their own concerns about balancing the demands of a career and a family. Did you catch that? Made up! In other words: not true. A myth. A falsehood. A calumny of unspeakable proportions.

Shame on all you women who have ever jumped on that bandwagon and slated us guys. Shame on all who have questioned our ability or dedication to vacuuming or cleaning. Shame, shame, and shame again!

It’s all one great big lie.

Really? Yeah right.

I’d dearly love this to be a beer-swilling, steak-munching rejoinder to all who have criticised men’s role around the house.

I’d love to wax lyrical about the injustice of it all and join Dr Meisenbach’s fightback.

But, with sincere apologies to any men’s lib campaigners out there, I just can’t.

Because the fact is that, in my case at least, it’s true. As far as I’m concerned, housework is awful and I’m awful at it.

I’m the lousy flatmate who never quite pulled his weight on the household rota; the one who would dodge the duster and shirk the chamois at every chance.

I get bored washing the dishes, I hate mopping the floor, I loathe any kind of gardening and I resent having to clean the windows but even above all that, there is one thing that gets to me more than any other. One thing that tips me over the edge into irrational irascibility. One job I hate more than any other… ironing.

That, for me, is where the whole irritating tedium of housework goes beyond ridiculous and not just because I’m hopelessly inept at it.

At least with most chores, grim as they are, you’re dealing with your own mess or mistakes.

The dishes are dirty because you used them. Fair enough. The floor needs mopping because you were careless while cooking. Fair enough. The skirting board needs painted because you chipped it. Fair enough.

But ironing? That’s where I draw the line.

Why should I have to do it? It wasn’t me who left the clothes in that ridiculous crumpled state. It was the washing machine, seemingly intent on doing origami with my shirts rather than simply getting rid of the ink stains and beer smells.

I can tell you’ll think I’m over-reacting here, but hear me out. This is meant to be the 21st century. We’ve put men on the moon, we’ve mastered DNA, and we’ve developed wireless 3G technology that defies belief.

We can clone animals, transplant organs and fit the entire contents of a library on a small memory chip.

Why, we’ve even got boffins in Switzerland on the verge of recreating the big bang. And yet people are still having to do their own ironing.

It’s an outrage I tell you; a complete miscarriage of justice, in which the householder is punished for the washing machine’s slapdash performance.

Dr Meisenbach may well have a point when she says the claim is exaggerated.

But I’m afraid the truth is, some of us really are gormless and grumpy with it.

There. That’s got that straight. Or straight enough anyway.