Professor John Sutherland

• JOHN Sutherland (born in 1938) boasts of buying his own house at age 27 while working as a junior university lecturer (The Generation game, Review, March 15).

In 1975, when The Sex Discrimination Act was passed, I shared a one-bed flat with two other girls in their mid-20s. When Sutherland was glorying in owner-occupation, the female of the species was expected to marry (or mistress) her way out of a bedsit or crowded flatshare.

One needed a male guarantor to buy a second-hand car, never mind a house. Even a rent-controlled studio flat required key-money beyond the means of most girls prior to equal pay.

Women born too early to benefit from equal opportunities at work, and who did not marry well, are some of the poorest people in retirement. One wonders how many professors of Sutherland’s age cohort were female?

JACQUELINE CASTLES
Westbourne Terrace, W2