TRACY GRIMSHAW THE BEAUTY OF TAKING A GAPYLAR

In her first interview back in the spotlight since leaving A Current Affair, Tracy Grimshaw opens up about the sheer delight of taking a year off to finally put herself first.

- SAMANTHA TRENOWETH

Tracy Grimshaw has "absolutely let go". For those who've been wondering, she hasn't a hint of regret about stepping away from A Current Affair, the iconic evening news and events program which she anchored for 17 nail-biting, engrossing, award-winning years. And she thinks Allison Langdon has deftly picked up the baton.

Does she ever feel like chiming in? "I definitely don't," she laughs.

"Ally's nailing it, and I'm not screaming questions at the television.

I'm very, very relaxed about all that." She looks relaxed in spite of the fact she's not long back from London and orders a double-shot latte to counteract the jet lag - all part of exploring her new-found freedom.

Tracy stepped away from Nine's flagship current affairs show in November 2022. She was 62 years old and when she started out in television 40 years earlier, she says, it was inconceivable that a woman could work in TV journalism into her sixties.

"When I started, at 21, I remember being told, 'Don't think you're going to be here for a long time," she tells The Weekly in her first interview back in the media after what we're dubbing her 'gap year". "There weren't many women on air at the age of 40, really.

Now we're babies at 40 in television.

So I think we've made some big gains over the years." Much has changed, but there's still so far to go, Tracy admits. We're meeting today, just a fortnight after thousands of Australians marched to demand urgent action to prevent violence against women. The last time there was a women's protest of this magnitude, in March 2021, Tracy made headlines when she gave then Prime Minister Scott Morrison a grilling.

It felt like an era-defining interview, coming in the wake of Brittany Higgins' allegations, rumours swirling around the then Attorney-General Christian Porter and the widely held view that the federal parliament was not a safe working environment for women.