THERE is an opinion, largely held by men, that women cannot keep a secret when they are asked not to mention it to anyone else.

The claim is that many females find it difficult to stop their tongues wagging.

It is my belief that men are equally guilty of the aforementioned traits.

I have a friend who is a lovely guy with no malice in him, but early on I realised Bill (not his real name) does not know when to keep his mouth shut or think carefully before he says something.

Many years ago we were on a charter flight from the south of England to Glasgow in a twin-engine aircraft with a capacity, if I recall correctly, of around 20 passengers.

The senior of the two pilots announced we were likely to run into a bit of bad weather but there was no cause for concern. Sure enough, we encountered a snow storm which would have been okay but for the fact one of the plane’s engines decided to give up the ghost.

We made a full-scale emergency landing at Manchester Airport with fire engines in attendance but the pilot at the controls did a magnificent job of getting us back on terra firma in one piece.

Upon entering the terminal, Bill said: “What am I going to tell Ruth (not her real name)? She will have kittens when she hears about our emergency landing.” I replied: “Just say we made a scheduled landing for refuelling but will have to stay here overnight because an airport worker broke something on the plane.” Upon my return from purchasing coffee for the pair of us, I passed Bill who, predictably, was at a pay phone telling his wife about snow storms, an engine failure and fire crews.

Last week I experienced another example of males with loose tongues.

At a gathering of acquaintances of both sexes, I became aware one of the fellows was gabbling on to a woman about something he should have kept to himself.

I accidentally stood on his foot but he failed to take the hint.