The executive chairman of Saatchi & Saatchi has been suspended after he denied that the lack of women in leadership roles was a problem in the advertising industry and said the debate about gender bias was “all over”.

The agency’s French parent company, Publicis, has put Kevin Roberts on leave following his comments in an interview with Business Insider.

Maurice Lévy, the chief executive of Publicis, said the company would not tolerate anyone who “does not value the importance of inclusion”.

In a statement to all staff, he said: “It is for the gravity of these statements that Kevin Roberts has been asked to take a leave of absence from Publicis Groupe, effective immediately. As a member of the directoire [executive board], it will ultimately be the Publicis Groupe supervisory board’s duty to further evaluate his standing.

“Promoting gender equality starts at the top and the group will not tolerate anyone speaking for our organisation who does not value the importance of inclusion. Publicis Groupe works very hard to champion diversity and will continue to insist that each agency’s leadership be champions of both diversity and inclusion.”

Roberts, who is from Lancashire, is also head coach at Publicis and has been at Saatchi & Saatchi’s helm for 20 years. In the interview, he said that rather than holding ambitions to climb the career ladder, many women, and men, simply wanted to be happy and “do great work”.

He said: “They are going: ‘Actually guys, you’re missing the point, you don’t understand: I’m way happier than you.’ Their ambition is not a vertical ambition; it’s this intrinsic, circular ambition to be happy.

“So they say: ‘We are not judging ourselves by those standards that you idiotic dinosaur-like men judge yourself by’. I don’t think [the lack of women in leadership roles] is a problem.

“I’m just not worried about it because they are very happy, they’re very successful, and doing great work. I can’t talk about sexual discrimination because we’ve never had that problem, thank goodness.”

Roberts said he did not spend any time on gender issues at his agencies, saying the issue was “way worse” in sectors such as financial services, where there are “problems left, right and centre”.

Asked about female campaigners such as the advertising consultant Cindy Gallop, who recently tweeted that sexual harassment was endemic in the media, advertising and every industry, Roberts said: “I think she’s got problems that are of her own making. I think she’s making up a lot of the stuff to create a profile, and to take applause, and to get on a soap[box].”

Saatchi & Saatchi was founded in London in 1970 by brothers Maurice and Charles. Its famous adverts include “Labour Isn’t Working”, which helped Margaret Thatcher to victory in 1979, and the Tony Blair “demon eyes” posters in 1996. Its clients include HSBC, EE and British Gas. It was taken over by Publicis in 2000 and now has more than than 6,500 employees.

Arthur Sadoun, the chief executive of Publicis Communications, the division that oversees Saatchi & Saatchi, criticised Roberts heavily.

“The way Kevin’s remarks were expressed I find offensive in terms of language and tonality. Behaviour like this is simply unacceptable in our Groupe,” Sadoun wrote in an internal note to staff.

“I am sorry that the comments made by Kevin have reflected poorly upon the Groupe and our culture. His views couldn’t be further from the truth about our commitment and feelings about gender diversity. I am very proud of being part of the Groupe, which is doing so much on gender equality, but I acknowledge that we, our industry and business at large are not where we need to be or where we aspire to be.

“This is an issue of critical importance to the Publicis Groupe and we are committed to being a role model. We have much more to do on this issue; it is a priority for me and all of Publicis Groupe leadership.”The chief executives running all six of the big advertising agency holding companies are men. A survey conducted by The 3% Conference in 2014 found women made up 46.4% of the advertising industry workforce, but only 11.5% of creative directors were female. The group, which champions female leadership, derives its name from the fact that just 3% of creative directors were women when it was founded in 2010.

Saatchi & Saatchi’s global chief creative director is Kate Stanners, and the company’s New York office is headed by a woman, Andrea Diquez. About 65% of Saatchi’s staff are female, compared with a split of about 50-50 at the parent group.

Lisen Stromberg, the acting chief operating officer of The 3% Conference, applauded Publicis and Lévy for refusing to tolerate gender bias.

Jan Gooding, the group brand director at the UK insurer Aviva, also lauded Gallop for speaking up, saying on Twitter that “problems flow from the top”.

Al MacCuish, the co-founder of the Sunshine agency, tweeted: “Unconscious bias? He’s just unconscious. His opinion doesn’t represent our business, our reality or our future.”