Dame Tessa Jowell: I'll live to see another woman PM Dame Tessa, already thought of by many who know her as a national treasure (and it's easy to see why after a couple of hours in her delightful company) has been an MP for 20 years. She was made a Dame last June - something she said "overwhelmed and delighted" her. But now she's in a reflective mood as she begins a new year - her first for long time without a spot on the front bench of the Commons. She's also sporting a rather fetching pair of black thick-rimmed circular glasses which she picked up in India (from which she has just returned with the Magic Bus young people's programme) that her children believe make her look like Wally - from the "Where's Wally?" books. I disagree vehemently, adjusting my own black thick-rimmed spectacles as I do so... The former Culture Secretary has held a number of different roles since she became the Labour MP for Dulwich and West Norwood in 1992, but having been Women's Minister twice for her party she tells me, the issues pertaining to women still remain a huge focus for her - and now more than ever. "When I was elected there were more MPs called John or Jonathan than women MPs," she remembers, half-smiling. What Dame Tessa did next It is this continued focus on women which is why Dame Tessa was picked by Labour to help mothers and babies in developing countries. She is teaming up with Sarah Brown (patron of the White Ribbon Alliance, which campaigns on maternal health in the developing world) to draw up a plan to try and introduce elements of Labour's Sure Start scheme in Africa and other developing countries. As founder of the Sure Start scheme, widely credited with improving the life changes of babies in poor British communities, the Labour Party has turned to Dame Tessa to try and create a blueprint to help these mothers and babies up to the age of five as part of the millennium development goals. Early intervention is so important as it really affects the early neurological development of children and determines their capabilities and the people they are to become. In a way I aim to take Sure Start back to what it first intended to be - giving support to vulnerable mothers so that they have the confidence to be their children's first teachers," she explains. Welfare State - what should it look like? Her other focus for the year is to contribute to Labour's thinking around the welfare state. Britain hasn't got a long term narrative around this - with increasing numbers of elderly people, huge numbers of young people who won't just do one job their whole lives and the question of childcare - is the universal principle out of date or just considered unaffordable? Dame Tessa ponders. Her focus couldn't be timely - especially in a week which has seen Prime Minister David Cameron cut child benefit for 1.1 million families - where a single earner is paid more than £60,000 a year, many of which have a mother at home looking after the children. David Cameron and Nick Clegg presenting at the Coalition's Mid Term Review At the same time the Prime and Deputy Prime Minister sketched out plans to support working mothers, which are likely to let working mothers claim back £2,000 per child per year to cover child care costs. The plans sound crazy and many questions remain about who will be eligible for this £2,000 to help with childcare costs. Is it a tax break or a subsidy and for what kind of childcare?" she asks. "What makes it hard to understand is that this proposal [the working mothers" tax break] is off the back of withdrawing child benefit from more than one million families. Secondly by reducing the childcare element of tax credits, having reduced the amount families get to spend on childcare - here is another idea to put money back in. So why take it out in the first place? Her frustrations are widely felt. But she believes Cameron needs to put forward a manifesto change on the welfare state as a whole if these changes go through. I think if this Government goes ahead with these changes it needs to re-address the principle of universalism currently underpinning the welfare state and axe other universal benefits such as the winter fuel allowance and freedom passes. However, when asked what Labour's position is on this and how it would save the money - the Chancellor George Osborne says is the reason for making these cuts, Dame Tessa is vague - saying her party is currently having a major policy review. But she does say if Labour was in government - it would have better macroeconomic and growth policies than Osborne currently does- meaning these particular cuts wouldn't need to happen - disproportionately affecting women - as the Government's previous round did too. David Cameron's 'women problem' Ah women and the Government - specifically Mr Cameron This is a topic on which Dame Tessa is brilliantly candid. I think it's a real problem," she says, unusually sharply. His "women problem" is all part of his failure to understand modern Britain," she concludes. David Cameron is failing to appeal to women Cameron's "women problem" which has been recognised by his aides, has not been helped by gaffes such as telling Angela Eagle, the shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, to "calm down dear" during a Commons debate in 2011. He also faced such criticism over his last Cabinet reshuffle, which left only four women with positions. Dame Tessa confides that she thinks it is a big problem for the country that women are routinely the casualties of the Prime Minister's "blind spot." David Cameron seems genuinely surprised that women expect to be equal in the modern world and he doesn't understand just how offensive some of his sexist language in the Commons really is. She also lambasts the Prime Minister for his general rudeness in the Commons - citing Cameron's jeering at the veteran Labour MP Dennis Skinner last January as a prime example. The only answer to yaboo politics is to treat all MPs respectfully - regardless of party - as they have all been elected by thousands of people to represent them in the Commons. The ghost of Tony Blair Dame Tessa, a true Blairite through and through, says Cameron just lacks the "easy self-deprecation" of Tony Blair and shares none of his communication skills - despite people in Number 10 , she hears, saying Cameron is most obsessed with the leadership style of the former Prime Minister. David Cameron is said to be obesessed with the leadership style of former PM Tony Blair But then she grows quite irritated saying: "David Cameron's problems are many fold: he honestly doesn't appear to know why he wants to be Prime Minister; he doesn't appear to understand how you create levers of power which get traction with the civil service system which enables change to happen and the third is that every week, almost without fail, he is deeply rude to members of the House of Commons." Prime Minister Ed? Although many would agree with her elements of her disparaging views of Cameron, I'm not too sure Dame Tessa's confidence in Prime Minister Ed (Miliband) appealing more to women is best placed yet. She thinks the junior Miliband is growing in confidence and empathy - and because he is better able to share his personal experiences as a father of two small children - rather than talking in policy abstraction - she thinks will appeal more to women than Cameron. Possibly - but he has to get to Number 10 first... An agenda for Maria Miller, the Women's Minister Aptly Dame Tessa asks where Maria Miller, the Women's Minister and Culture Secretary, has been this week during all of the Government's child benefit changes and new measures for working mothers - saying her absence speaks volumes about the Coalition. However, she does have an agenda for her - which she happily shares. I think body image for women is still a major issue. It was when I was in Government and travelled around the country speaking to 500 young women about their perceptions of themselves and their ambitions. She needs to do the same to update the picture and go into this sort of tricky territory," Dame Tessa explains. Where was Maria Miller this week? Maria Miller, she expands, needs to help young women deal with this issue - "which is half way out of the cupboard" by continuing to address the presentation of women in the media and fashion industry - and ensuring there are decent role models for them. And this brings her nicely onto her other wish for Cameron's Women's Minister (a job Dame Tessa admits always makes the person in it the butt of a lot of sexist jokes in the Commons): to continue to help close the gender pay gap. Maria [Miller] also needs to keep working on this area which begins at a young age on the newspaper round. Boys get paid more than girls - but why? That's something which must not be left alone," she says - nodding adamantly. There is still very much a role for a Women's Minister. Just as there is for feminism. While the circumstances of women's lives create unintended and un-sought-for inequality - then there is a role for feminism. It simply means recognising the different circumstances of men and women's lives and mitigating the discriminatory aspects for women which constrain their freedoms and dreams. Woman for PM? However, it is not all doom and gloom in Dame Tessa's outlook for women in Britain today. In fact far from it. When I ask her if she thinks there could ever be another female Prime Minister in her lifetime - she instantly replies "yes" without missing a beat. Rachel Reeves is tipped for the top "Yes, of course I do Emma," she says. I press her for predictions. When pushed she goes for Rachel Reeves, Labour's high-flying Chief Secretary to the Treasury - but then instantly worries that the prediction in itself will stress out Reeves who is expecting her first child in March. From everything I have seen and read about Reeves - I think she'll be able to handle it. Dame Tessa is also cheered by young women's greater self-confidence and expectations of how they should be treated. She cites her daughter as an example. The awful Jimmy Savile stories just wouldn't happen in the same way today. If my daughter was ever treated inappropriately by a man - she would slap him in the face. However, in the 70s and 80s, women had no where to turn - nor would they know to do that. As she always says to me - "Mum, you can't be a little bit equal." And this vigilance has to continue to ensure the horrors of the past don't happen again. "Equality is an absolute and while inequality persists - you cannot claim society is equal," she says. The love the office Looking out from her comfy office - armchairs adorned with lots of plump cushions, a vase filled with flowers and obviously a nice bowl of pineapple (fast diminishing) - over the Thames and within eyeshot of Big Ben - you can understand why Dame Tessa, who trained as a social worker (which must have helped hone her great interpersonal skills), just loved being in Government. The same passion which fuelled her to fight for the Olympics, has fuelled many of her other desires to help people and the UK. But she has also experienced the tough sides of living life in the public eye after her lawyer husband David Mills was accused of taking a bribe from Silvio Berlusconi (the case was eventually thrown out in 2010 on appeal last year because of a statute of limitations technicality). In spite of the ups and downs of a politician's life - Dame Tessa still craves to be in Government - on the front line - making changes and suggestions such as Sure Start and the Olympics - the two things which she hopes will define her political legacy for years to come. Dame Tessa loved being in Government I loved being in Government. I was in it for 13 years and I loved it every day. I would trade four years in opposition now to be in Government for one day to do some of things I think this country so desperately needs. You wouldn't be able to do them in one day - but at least you could make the case," she says wistfully. However, she is under no illusion about the current sway all politicians have at the moment with the general public during this tough economic time. "The last line in this is really the sense that as we politicians come back to Westminster in the frenzy of the start of term, people around the country are tuning out and finding their own solutions as politics is seen as less and less relevant," she warns. Dame Tessa welcomes the Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg's debut on LBC radio today - taking questions every week from listeners on a live phone-in. "Maybe that's one small way of getting through and it's good for politicians to put themselves in tough positions," she says. This Government needs to speak to people in their living rooms and get through to them. I just hope they are listening - women and men together.