"Girls today have never had it so good, right?" said Rose. "Apart from the fact that you've got more equality than you ever can deal with, the fact of the matter is that you've got real democracy and there really are no glass ceilings, despite the fact that some of you moan about it all the time.
"Women can get to the top of any single job that they want to in the UK. You've got a woman fighter pilot who went on to join the Red Arrows ... I mean what else do you want, for God's sake? Women astronauts. Women miners. Women dentists. Women doctors. Women managing directors. What is it you haven't got?"
Rose also dismissed the idea that having children can create an uneven playing field for working mothers.
"Childbirth is a biological fact," he said. "Women have children: I can't help that. But I know lots of women who have got two or three kids - Nicola Horlick is a good example - there are many girls in here [Marks & Spencer] who have got two kids who come to work. Kate Bostock [recently appointed to oversee the company's UK merchandising operation, including clothes and homeware] has got two or three kids and she's running the full-time, biggest buying job in the UK, so it can be done."
I emphasised the bits I found disrespectful and/or unbelievable. Girls? Moaning? Dismissing major concerns because there has been ONE female fighter pilot who joined the Red Arrows? And all of this from the male head of a company that until a month ago penalised women financially for having larger breasts.
Just because it can be done doesn't mean that women can do it with the same ease or for the same rewards as men. So some well-paid women (almost certainly middle-class, university educated and very likely white, heterosexual and of a socially acceptable body weight) have children and work. THEY CAN AFFORD NANNIES, CLEANERS AND BABYSITTERS. That's not gender equality, that's class privilege.
He says that women have children and he can't help that, but I beg to differ; there are many things that large companies can do regarding maternity leave, promotions, breastfeeding or childcare in an attempt to level out the playing field for working mothers. Whether or not M&S do those things is beside the point. To claim that having children is just something women do and that all the employment issues it leads to have been completely overcome is ignorant and offensive to the many, many women who struggle to raise their children and work in a society that, on the whole, does not support this aim unless the women are wealthy enough to afford childcare from the start.
Frankly, I'd be more interested to know if these women he discuss in his article (sorry, 'girls') are paid the same amount as men at the same level of the company, because the evidence overwhelmingly suggests otherwise.
(Countered with some good points in The Guardian a few days later:
Would you buy knickers from this man?)
