In the US at least, the hardest-hit industries so far have been construction, manufacturing, and certain service-sector jobs (retailing, hotels etc.). The former two sectors, particularly construction, employ far more men than women. At the same time, healthcare and education--industries employing large numbers of women--are holding steady, even growing slightly, for now anyway. So the total number of (US) men losing jobs has been higher than the number of women. Similarly, Latino men are also overrepresented among the newly unemployed (compared to white or black men) because Latino men are proportionally overrepresented in construction.
Not sure what the UK's unemployment trends are like, but if they look much like ours, this could be the explanation. Of course, when you're talking about the impact of the recession on individual households, you'd also be looking at how many adults in the household work, how much each earns compared to the others, are there dependents who can't work in the household, etc.
(ETA: Looks like AliEnvy just made pretty much the same point.)