Godfrey Bloom, a new MEP for the UK Independence Party, has put himself forward as a member of the European parliament's women's rights committee.

He said: "I just think they don't clean behind the fridge enough. I am here to represent Yorkshire women, who always have the dinner on the table when you get home. I am going to promote men's rights."

He later told a television interviewer: "The more women's rights you have, it's actually a bar to their employment. No self-respecting small businessman with a brain in the right place would ever employ a lady of child-bearing age.

"That isn't politically correct, is it? But it's a fact of life. I know, because I am a businessman."

Bloom's wife, Katie, was unavailable for comment last night.