‘Hey girls, drop out of uni and have a baby by 27’
‘Passionate feminist’ Kirstie Allsopp says young women should focus on getting preggers
The TabTV presenter Kirstie Allsopp has told women to ditch university and find a boyfriend to have a baby with.
In an interview with the Telegraph, the self-described “passionate feminist” said if she had a daughter she would tell her: “Darling, do you know what? Don’t go to university.
“Start work straight after school, stay at home, save up your deposit – I’ll help you, let’s get you into a flat. And then we can find you a nice boyfriend and you can have a baby by the time you’re 27.”
Kirstie Allsopp said women should focus on having a baby while they’re young
Allsopp, best known for fronting Daily Mail readers’ favourite Location, Location, Location, said women should not go to university “because it’s an experience”.
Instead, she said, they should focus on having a baby while they are young and fertile, before going to uni later in life to learn something.
She said: “Women are being let down by the system. We should speak honestly and frankly about fertility and the fact it falls off a cliff when you’re 35.
“We should talk openly about university and whether going when you’re young, when we live so much longer, is really the way forward. At the moment, women have 15 years to go to university, get their career on track, try and buy a home, and have a baby.
“That is a hell of a lot to ask someone. As a passionate feminist, I feel we have not been honest enough with women about this issue.”
Allsopp is the face of several programmes about owning houses
The presenter, who counts David Cameron among her pals and has the title “The Honorable” because her father is the 6th Baron Hindlip, explained women should go to university later in life.
She said: “We have all this time at the end. You can do your career afterwards. We have to readjust. And men can have fun after they have kids. If everyone started having children when they were 20, they’d be free as a bird by the time they were 45. But how many 45-year-olds do you know who are bogged down?
“I don’t want the next generation of women to go through the heartache that my generation has. At the moment we are changing the natural order of things, with grandparents being much older and everyone squeezed in the middle. Don’t think ‘my youth should be longer’. Don’t go to university because it’s an ‘experience’. No, it’s where you’re supposed to learn something! Do it when you’re 50!”
And she came under fire immediately for her comments, with Telegraph women’s editor Emma Barnett branding her a “laughing stock”.