TV veteran David Dimbleby has criticised the BBC and other broadcasters for demeaning older women.
The commentator and presenter, 74, was catapulted into the debate about sexism at the BBC when former newsreader Anna Ford branded him a “charming dinosaur”.
The former Six O’Clock News presenter said she wondered how “charming dinosaurs” such as Dimbleby and John Simpson continued to win BBC contracts when “however hard I look, I fail to see any woman of the same age, the same intelligence and the same rather baggy looks” on the small-screen.
Asked about Ford getting angry about the issue of ageism against women in broadcasting, the Question Time presenter told the Radio Times: “Well, I don’t know that she does. I think she gets terribly cross about not being on television herself, I think.”
However, he said it was time for the BBC and other broadcasters to change their attitude.
“Why should age matter with women? Women mature elegantly and better than men, very often. I don’t think age should be a factor for women appearing on television,” he said.
“There is a section among television executives who are always being hammered quite wrongly in my view to get the biggest possible audience, and (they are told) attractive young women will bring in a bigger audience than less attractive, older women to say nothing of less attractive older men, like me.
“That’s the way the TV not just the BBC industry works. And I think it’s wrong.
“If you look at American TV you’ll find it keeps women at work. They use their experience in same way they would use John Simpson’s experience or mine, such as it is.
“It’s just a cultural shift that’s needed. And I agree, it is demeaning to women and I also think it’s a crazy loss of talent.”
The issue hit the headlines when Countryfile presenter Miriam O’Reilly won an age discrimination case against the corporation after she was rejected for a role on a revamped version of the popular rural affairs programme.
Several figures, including Selina Scott and Dame Joan Bakewell, have criticised broadcasters on the issue, accusing them of banishing older women from the screen.