May 12 – The boss of England’s Premier League has been forced to apologise over alleged sexist comments but has nevertheless been condemned by women’s groups and politicians.
The comments, in private emails sent by Richard Scudamore, the public face of the Premier League, were leaked to a British Sunday newspaper by his former personal assistant and led to him releasing a statement apologising for his “inappropriate” remarks, calling them an “error of judgement”.
A few hours before Manchester City clinched their second domestic title in three years, Scudamore cancelled a BBC Radio appearance on Sunday for “legal reasons” following publication of the story and now faces accusations of hypocrisy having regularly championed equality for women in football.
Trying to lessen the blow, he insisted that the comments were made in “private emails exchanged between colleagues and friends of many years.”
“They were received from and sent to my private and confidential email address, which a temporary employee who was with the organisation for only a matter of weeks, should not have accessed and was under no instruction to do so.
“Nonetheless I accept the contents are inappropriate and apologise for any offence caused, particularly to this person.”
Former British culture secretary Tessa Jowell told the BBC that Scudamore’s “championing of women’s football, and women’s football coming of age, is undermined” by the remarks .
“You can’t have one position publicly and then be laughing privately. In the world of social media and email, there is no public and private,” she said. “I hope his public commitment to women’s sport will prevail. He’s shown contrition and will be mortified by this, as indeed he should be.”
Another politician Tracey Crouch, who sits on Parliament’s culture, media and sport select committee said: “It’s disappointing at a time when he’s trying to encourage more women to play football that he is using derogatory terminology.”
Women in Football, a group aiming to improve women’s representation in the game, have said they were “shocked” by the reports.
A spokesperson for the group was quoted as saying: “We expect the Premier League to conduct a full and proper investigation. Sexism, as with racism and homophobia, is not acceptable in the workplace.”
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