FIGURES FROM ACROSS the worlds of UK politics, show business and journalism have been paying tribute to Esther Rantzen, following the death of the broadcaster and campaigner at the age of 86.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Rantzen was best known on this side of the Irish Sea for her consumer champion role as the mainstay of the long-running BBC show That\u2019s Life.\u00a0<\/p>\n
She also founded the children\u2019s charity Childline and in later years was an impassioned campaigner for the campaign to legalise assisted dying for the terminally ill.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A satirical consumer affairs show, That\u2019s Life was a ratings behemoth for the BBC and ran for over 20 years, from 1973.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The show, which was also hugely popular in Ireland, was an odd mix of consumer campaigning interspersed with humorous readings of press cuttings, funny poems and reports about talking dogs.<\/a><\/p>\n Rantzen also hosted a sequence that\u2019s regularly cited as one of the most memorable TV moments ever \u2013 a tribute to humanitarian Nicholas Winton,\u00a0who organised the rescue of hundreds of children who had been destined for Nazi concentration camps.<\/p>\n Winton, a stockbroker, arranged trains to carry Jewish children out of occupied Prague and worked to find British families to look after them throughout the Second World War.\u00a0<\/p>\n He kept quiet about his efforts for decades \u2013 until the famous segment on That\u2019s Life in 1988 when he was surprised by dozens of the children, now adults, that he had saved.\u00a0<\/p>\n In the wake of the announcement of Rantzen\u2019s death, broadcaster Lewis Goodall described the item<\/a> as \u201cpossibly the greatest moment of all television, of all time\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n Goodbye to Dame Esther Rantzen.
Thanks for this all time great TV moment\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/GkrCh897Ft<\/a><\/p>\n