Sometimes men deserve to be paid more

It is 100 years since women got the vote and I have been joining in the celebrations, on public transport — lightly tapping attractive women on the knee or gently massaging their lovely shoulders and saying, cheerfully, ‘Well done, babes!’ Some react with anger and irritation to my heartfelt congratulations, especially when I ask for their phone numbers so that we might discuss suffrage further — which is, I suppose, an indication they did not really want the vote in the first place. Certainly it imposes a terrible pressure upon them — they are forced, every five years, to make a clear decision.

The statistics suggest many resent this imposition deeply, with women twice as likely as men to remain ‘don’t knows’ until the final minute: you can see them all, on polling days, making their way to the booth in a pretty little cloud of confusion. They are actually more likely to vote than men, and much less likely to know what they are voting about or for.