Malcolm Wicks, Minister for Science and Innovation, has been talking to Nasa about US-British co-operation in space research. There is a possibility of two British Moon probes, the second to explore the prospects for a human colony there. But who could we send to set it up? The need to establish his legacy in history grows ever more urgent in Tony Blair’s thoughts. It almost seems to preoccupy our Prime Minister. Iraq is not looking good, Afghanistan is problematical, devolution may be going off the rails, Northern Ireland is far from sorted and public service reform has got all tangled up.

So — I hesitate to broach this lest it be taken amiss — but who better to be the first Briton on the Moon than Mr Blair? And for many years now I have detected what I can only call an astronaut-look in the great man’s eye — floating (if I may say so) in a most peculiar way.

The Blair Moon Project: if that isn’t a legacy, what is? Strapped into his rocket, Legacy I, Mr Blair would surely feel the Hand of History on his shoulder as the final countdown proceeded. Many of us, I know, would be keen to attend the blast-off in person. Gordon Brown would surely wish to lead the cheers as his predecessor set forth on his last and boldest mission — indeed this could be a way of securing enthusiastic Treasury funding for the programme.

Now it’s time to leave the capsule if you dare. “Brown Control to Major Tony: Your circuit’s dead, there’s something wrong/ Can you hear me Major Tony? Can you hear me Major Tony?”

• Over the winter holiday with friends and family, I watched on DVD a film called Tea with Mussolini. It wasn’t much cop except — and this rescued it — that the film was a vehicle for three actresses (Joan Plowright, Maggie Smith and Judi Dench) playing three marvellous old ladies. The year before we had watched Ladies in Lavender — again, a slight film, but charming for its lead portrayals of two old ladies played by Dench and Smith.

  What is it about our love affair with old ladies? Blanche in Coronation Street; Dot Cotton in EastEnders; Dame Edith Evans as Lady Bracknell; Lady Trumpington as Lady Trumpington (in the House of Lords); Edna Everage; Margaret Rutherford; The Golden Girls. In theatre, literature, TV drama, comedy and in life the British public are more reliably smitten by a characterful old lady than by any other age and gender. For a woman, becoming an old lady can be the apogee of life and career in a way that turning into an old man can never crown a man’s story.

  Which brings me to a mystery. Why do television and radio fail to recognise what novelists and playwrights have long understood? Viewers love old ladies on the small screen and the radio, but TV editors shun them except in fictional roles. Where are the old lady weather presenters, the old lady newscasters, chat show hosts, commentators, pet consultants? Where, for heaven’s sake, are the old lady presenters of children’s TV? Wrinkles are a challenge to any media career but a challenge that men do overcome regularly. Ludovic Kennedy, Jimmy Young, Michael Parkinson, Patrick Moore all did. Far fewer women are allowed to get through. If the BBC or ITV had the courage to pick pensionable women to anchor programmes, they’d find it was rewarded with a devoted following.

  Some time ago I was involved with Restoration, a TV series involving a competition to choose a project for lottery funding. Viewers’ votes turned it into a pitched battle between two old ladies. One owned a castle in Northern Ireland; the other had trained half a century ago in what had become a decrepit swimming bath in Manchester, and gone on to Olympic gold. Both were fantastic, spirited characters. We were soon more interested in the old ladies than the old piles.

  Broadcasting bosses: you overlook a resource on your own doorsteps. Don’t fire your female presenters when they hit 60. Grow them into on-screen, on-air, on-digital old ladies.

• Ruth Kelly has made one, though only one, big mistake. I don’t agree with my colleague Alice Miles, who wrote yesterday that for a Labour Cabinet minister to send her son to a fee-paying school is indefensible. What was indefensible was Ms Kelly’s attempted gag on the press reporting it. There is honest debate to be had about the boundaries between political duty and home life. No way is that debate out of order in this case. This is not France. What possessed Ms Kelly to suppose the public could be forbidden to know of her decision? The resulting fuss serves her right.

Times Recommends

• We have kit and leadership. Let’s go
• Behind the scenes at the biggest deal
• Conferences — what a waste of money