Two lawmakers in the US have suggested women should spend Sunday mornings making their husbands breakfast in bed.

The representatives of North Dakota made their comments in defence of the state’s ‘Blue Laws’, which require some businesses to open late on Sunday mornings and others to stay closed all day.

They argued that businesses should be shut on Sunday mornings so that wives across the state could stay at home and pander to their husbands’ needs.

Republican Bernie Satrom said Sundays should be for spending time with your husband, “making him breakfast, bringing it to him in bed, and then after you’re done with that, go take your kids for a walk.”

Because women couldn’t possibly have anything else to do with their time than prepare food and look after children. Oh, except if businesses were open, in which case we’d go shopping, of course.

Satrom was backed up by Representative Vernon Laning, who said: “I don’t know about you but my wife has no problem spending everything I earn in six and a half days. I don’t think it hurts at all to have half a day off.”

Unsurprisingly, their remarks have provoked outrage.

One young woman from Fargo in North Dakota told Valley News Live: “It’s frustrating personally because when you know that those are the people representing you [...] when these backwards ways of thinking are still present, it’s upsetting.”

When confronted by a journalist about the comments, Satrom laughed and said they was only meant to be humorous, he couldn’t understand why people had taken it personally, and maybe those people lack a sense of humour.