Theresa comes out for Legs-it!

As Lefties lose the plot over the Mail’s mischievous front page, the PM declares: ‘If people want to have a bit of fun about how we dress, then so be it’

THERESA MAY has dismissed complaints over the ‘ Legs- it!’ headline in yesterday’s Daily Mail, calling it a ‘bit of fun’.

Alongside a front-page picture of Mrs May and Nicola Sturgeon at their meeting in Glasgow on Monday, the Mail ran the headline ‘Never mind Brexit, who won Legs-it!’.

The headline pointed to an article inside by Mail columnist Sarah Vine, a ‘lighthearted verdict on the big showdown’, which appeared alongside a serious news report.

Within minutes of it appearing on Monday night, Left-wing politicians took to Twitter to complain it was sexist.

Yesterday morning, the BBC conducted a debate on the headline on Today, its flagship current affairs programme on Radio 4. Justin Webb described the Mail’s coverage as ‘two powerful women but the legs are the story’.

Catherine Mayer, the co-founder of the Women’s Equality Party, told the programme the headline was an attempt to ‘sideline, sexualise and minimise’ the two women, and had ‘diminished their power’.

But newspaper columnist Angela Epstein told her: ‘Anybody who is in the public eye will be scrutinised for their appearance — Jeremy Corbyn, Ed Miliband, Michael Foot — there has been a litany of male politicians who have been scrutinised for their lack of professional appearance.

‘Theresa May and Nicola Sturgeon — whether you agree with their politics or not — are amazing role models for what women can achieve . . . They’ve both got fantastic legs, they both appear in a photo shoot which isn’t going to detract from that.’

The Mail accused its critics of having ‘lost all sense of humour and proportion’. A spokesman said: ‘For goodness sake, get a life! Sarah Vine’s piece, which was flagged as light-hearted, was a side- bar alongside a serious political story.

‘It appeared in an 84-page paper packed with important news and analysis, a front-page exclusive on cost- cutting in the NHS and a health supplement devoted to women’s health issues.

‘For the record, the Mail was the paper which, more than any other, backed Theresa May for the top job. Again, for the record, we often comment on the appearance of male politicians including Cameron’s waistline, Osborne’s hair, Corbyn’s clothes — and even Boris’s legs.

‘Is there a rule that says political coverage must be dull, or has a po- commentariat,faced BBC so and obsessed Left- by wing the Daily Mail, lost all sense of humour . . . and proportion?’

Mrs May yesterday laughed off the headline. On a visit to the West Midlands, the PM told the Wolverhampton Express & Star: ‘You will notice that I am wearing trousers today!

‘As a woman in politics, throughout my whole career I have found that, very often, what I wear — particularly my shoes — has been an issue that has been looked at rather closely by people.

‘Obviously, what we do as politicians is what makes a difference to people’s lives. I think that most people concentrate on what we do as politicians. But if people want to have a bit of fun about how we dress, then so be it.’ Earlier, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn had written on Twitter: ‘It’s 2017. This sexism must be consigned to history.’ Former deputy Labour leader Harriet Harman wrote: ‘Moronic! And we are in 2017!’ Former Labour leader Ed Miliband wrote: ‘The 1950s called and asked for their headline back.’ In the Guardian, columnist Owen Jones hyperventilated: ‘It comes to something when this open sewer is still capable of shocking us with its stench. The newspaper’s decision to objectify the legs of the country’s most prominent female politicians — focusing on what they look like rather than what they stand for — represents one of its many lows. ‘But while it should be mocked, parodied, ridiculed, it should terrify us: because it is indicative of what is happening in Brexit Britain.’ And the paper’s Zoe Williams opined: ‘This nonsense on stilts has a purpose: they can say what they like, these women, but in the end, they are still women. Let their legs do the talking.’ But in the Spectator, Ross Clark said the Left had reacted in an ‘absurdlying story which versy’.said: The ‘its ‘I on headlinecalledownOn think Radio overblownthe obsessionit peoplethe was4’s show, ‘Legs-itWorldalso way’ havewith Missthe At contro- expos-trivia’.had third One,Vinea slight didn’t‘I wasn’t sense insult horridof either humour aboutof them.’ failure. them, I Tory Miss MP Vine, Michael whose Gove, husband dismissedis the claim women politicians are criticised more about their appearance than men. ‘I’m married to a man who was once described as having a face that looked like a foetus in a jar, so people are very rude about male politicians.’

Lost all sense of humour and proportion