Harriet Harman told The Sunday Times: "I don't agree with all male leaderships. Men cannot be left to run things on their own. I think it's thoroughly bad to have a men-only leadership."
The Deputy Labour leader's predecessor John Prescott has hit back on his blog: "Success doesn't come from saying all male leaderships are bad and trying to change the party rules to ban all male leaderships. This would change one member one vote - which John Smith and I fought very hard to introduce - to one man, one woman, one vote for leadership elections. Why take away from the party the right to choose its leaders on the basis of ability?"