A record 14.4 million women are in work, including three quarters of a million more since the general election.

Employment Minister Esther McVey said: “Up and down the country the women of the UK have been staging a quiet revolution – they’ve been getting on and making choices about the world of work in areas such as management, science or construction that many of their mothers and grandmothers might never have considered for themselves.

“This means that in the past four years we’ve seen women knocking employment records aside.

“Women are in work in unprecedented numbers, and recent growth has been overwhelmingly into the top professions – and there is no better role model for young women at the start of their career journey than seeing other women make it and know that it can be possible for them too. ”

The report was published ahead of the latest unemployment figures on Wednesday.

Leading business women will encourage other female entrepreneurs to look overseas to expand their business during this week’s Export Week, the Government announced.

Export Week is organised by UK Trade & Investment (UKTI) to encourage small and medium-sized companies to seek customers overseas with over 90 events across the UK and over 6,000 businesses expected to attend.

Trade Minister Lord Livingston said: “The number of women setting up businesses has doubled compared to a few years ago, but at the moment companies set up by women are consistently less likely to export. We have hugely increased the number of companies receiving Government export support but currently only one in 10 of these firms are women-led.”