Letter: I can do it too, mummy, funding permitted

Sir: Your leading article 'So this is what you do daddy. . . so could I' (29 April) misses the point. Surely the aim of the Take Our Daughters To Work Day was to produce the thoughts, 'So this is what you do mummy. . . so could I'. As children grow up and develop ambitions, role models, by exemplifying possibilities, give children the courage and the confidence to believe in the possibility of fulfilling their dreams and the determination to work towards that aim.

Lazy generalisations, such as all 800 girls visiting the BBC on Thursday were visiting 'their fathers' workplaces', merely show the need for 'modern gesture politics' as you, so ungraciously, put it. Despite their often low-profile and small (but growing) numbers, there are women in traditionally male-dominated professions - if there weren't, taking daughters to the workplace would be rather counter-productive.

Yours faithfully,

RACHEL WINTER

Glasgow

29 April