Campaigner Esther’s

thought to have claimed the lives of 80 people. Dame Esther is clearly distressed by the tragedy.

“The terrible event at Grenfell Tower – which is not far from where I live; I see it when I travel – is a symbol of what can happen when people do not take risk seriously enough and fail to recognise how vulnerable people are.” She is in no doubt how her cherished late husband – documentar y maker Desmond Wilcox – wou ld h a v e approached coverage of the tragedy. “It would be a campaign for us, like our campaign for seatbelts for children and

safer playgrounds,” she reveals. “If we had That’s Life now we would talk about the crucial creation of more than one way of escaping.

“You cannot have a single staircase that fills with toxic fumes. And why were they toxic when we have done so much about old furniture to get rid of toxic materials?

“There are questions.”

Her campaigning consumer and human rights show made Esther a household name and was the launchpad for Childline.

But she has been tight-lipped about its possible return – until now.

Laying down her fork, she reveals: “That’s Life came off air in 1994. It is probably about now that people are feeling quite nostalgic for it.

“I have been involved in preliminary talks – to help create it again, rather than present. I think it would really suit the times.”

It is Esther’s

so many

inability to