Godfrey Bloom, the Ukip MEP who sparked controversy by claiming British foreign aid should not be sent to “Bongo-Bongo land”, has courted controversy again by claiming that women are better at finding “mustard in the pantry” than driving cars.

In a piece for Politics.co.uk, Mr Bloom deployed gender stereotypes more suited to the 1920s.

He said: “Men and women care about different things on a micro-scale. Leaving the lavatory seat up, wet towels on the bed and the top left off the toothpaste will drive a wife made. A man simply cannot understand what the problem is. Most wives do not regard putting petrol in the car as any part of their responsibility. Men cannot see the point in making the bed if you are going to get back in it tonight.”

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The Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire MEP added that feminism was a “passing fashion” created by “shrill, bored, middle-class women of a certain physical genre.” He continued: “They are supported usually by men who seem to have no link with the usual social and sporting male preserves, the slightly effete politically correct chaps who get sand kicked in their face on the beach.”