Why Feminists Must Step into the 21st Century; A Question of Family: Sir Alan Sugar, with Apprentice Winner Michelle Dewberry, Is Right to Be Concerned

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Byline: Katie Grant

AS our 22-year-old daughter heads off for her first job interview, I ask myself: would it be objectionable for her potential employer to ask if she is thinking of having children any time soon? Of course, this is entirely hypothetical, since such a question has been ruled out of bounds by the equality lobby. And when The Apprentice's Sir Alan Sugar suggested that not being allowed to ask might well result in employers throwing out women's CVs without even reading them, he was roundly denounced.

Had they dared brave the fury of the 'Porkers Have Feelings Too' society, his critics might even have called him a male chauvinist pig, a good oldfashioned insult that was as ubiquitous in the 1970s as prawn cocktail and Bohemian Rhapsody.

And that, it seems to me, is part of the problem for women today. The voices raised on our behalf - Scottish voices among them - sound increasingly to come from another era.

I noticed it on Radio 4's Any Questions, as the women panellists were shrill with concern at the …