CHEZ: CHANGE THE RECORD ON SEXISM Bucks Fizz star ‘frozen out when she hit 40s’

CHERYL Baker has claimed sexism is rife in the television industry.

The Bucks Fizz singer was one of our most popular presenters years ago, with hit shows such as

Record Breakers.

But the offers stopped coming in when she hit her mid-40s.

Cheryl, 67, said:

“For years I was presenting on TV six days a week. But in 1997 everything changed. I filmed an episode of

This Is Your Life and it was the kiss of death. After that, I couldn’t get work. The TV presenting just stopped.

“I wasn’t on TV for years… the difference was crazy.” Cheryl reckons men don’t suffer the same problems as they get older.

She added: “It’s a man’s world when you get to a certain age. As a man you can be any age and still be a presenter. But it’s very rare that you see an older woman doing it after a certain age. If you’re a woman, you’ve got to be young.”

This happened more than 20 years ago.

Coleen Nolan recently claimed she was told she would need to get a gastric band to land work on primetime shows.

She said: “I have had a head of a big TV company saying: ‘If you want to get on primetime television you should get a gastric band. You’re too big to present primetime.’ And yet you see all these guys in primetime, some overweight and some certainly in their 60s and 70s.

“It’s better than it was years ago but, equally, if you look at Loose Women, there isn’t another show on any channel that has that range of women all at once presenting a TV show.”