Women say they spend longer on housework than their men

A poll for BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour suggests that women spend an average of 11-and-a-half hours doing housework by their own estimation, while men complete just six hours.

The survey, commissioned to launch a week of special programmes to launch the Woman’s Hour Chore Calculator, found the most popular bit of housework was cooking.

The vast majority of women said their chief responsibilities included changing sheets and cleaning the toilets, while men were mainly in charge of bins and DIY Jobs.

The least popular tasks for both sexes were loo cleaning and ironing. Some 86% of women polled said they were mainly responsible for changing the bedsheets, while 83% said they were responsible for cleaning the toilet.

Some 80% of men said they were mainly responsible for taking out the bins, with 78% saying they did the DIY.

Woman’s Hour presenter Jane Garvey said: “Times have changed. Women are no longer trapped in the home - they can go out to work then come back and start the housework.”

Adam Ludlow of polling firm ComRes, which undertook the survey, said: “These results indicate there is a clear divide between the sexes when it comes to housework.

“It’s also interesting to note that in polls of this kind, men tend to be bolder in their claims often leading to overestimation whereas women tend to be more cautious and err on the side of underestimation.”

The survey also found that more than a quarter (27%) of cohabiting couples argued about household chores several a month, and most often among younger couples.

The programme is launching its Chore Wars calculator online to enable listeners to calculate the division of responsibilities at home with the aid of a quiz at bbc.co.uk/womanshour.