It’s all systems go for the Loose Women team this week. On Sunday, for the first time in the show’s 25-year history, the team gets to walk the Bafta red carpet as nominees.

It’s a big moment for a programme that is too often perceived as fodder for women who like complaining and attacking men. Nothing could be further from the truth, and yet for some, it’s easier to dismiss a show headed up by women as “nonsense” rather than accept that we are capable of making impactful, funny, intelligent television which make a difference to women and men up and down the country. Shows headed up by groups of men are rarely dismissed in such fashion.

For the uninitiated, let me talk through how Loose Women works. It’s a four-person panel show with a rotating on-screen team of more than 20 women. We discuss everything: the big stories of the day, politics, health, popular culture, education, family and more. If there is something affecting your day-to-day life, we’ve probably talked about it. On occasion, men join in with Loose Women, and sometimes we team up for Loose Women and Men.

The impact of live daytime TV is easily underestimated by people who have grown so used to having it on in the background. But for those who don’t gravitate to highbrow current affairs programmes like the Today programme and Newsnight, where can they go to hear about what’s going on in the world in a way that they enjoy, connect with, and understand? Loose Women, of course. 

Regular Loose Women viewers know that as well as the laughs and the confessionals from presenters, at 1.30pm they will reach the end of the show having learned a thing or two about the world. Perhaps they will finish watching with a better understanding of a big political story they had been struggling to get their heads around.

We have some of the most intelligent, engaging, and honest female broadcasters in the business, who cover a cross-section of British society (more so than any other show on British TV). Yet we are rarely spoken about in the same breath as our male equivalents. Why? I guess it boils down to good old sexism, and a smattering of classism too. But as other shows dabble in making their output more representative,  Loose Women has been quietly doing that for years, with our viewers enjoying seeing more of their lives reflected on screen.

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I joined the panel four years ago during the pandemic, after returning to work following baby number two. Having had two maternity leaves with Loose Women as a part of the soundtrack to days alone at home tending to a newborn, I felt a renewed connection to the show, and joining provided the perfect accompaniment to my other job on ITV News.

Where else will you hear opinions on changes to legislation from single parents often going without food to feed their kids? Where else do you see people battling depression talk honestly about the effect on their families, while also highlighting the under-funding of mental health services?

Where else will you find women fielding questions from the panel about the realities of being gay in the Army, doing HIV tests live on air, and giving blood live on air to encourage more people in Black and Asian communities to sign up as donors? 

On our show you will see women speaking about being domestic abuse survivors, and speaking directly to others who are experiencing it. We’ve had episodes dedicated to the deaf community, the neurodiverse, and all-Black panels. We still get viewers stopping us in the street to share their gratitude for helping them through severe loneliness and confusion during the dark days of lockdown.

All this while raising laughs, taking the mick out of each other, and remaining friends when we have differing opinions. Nonsense, this show is not.

There are no other all-female shows on British TV, 25 years after Loose Women’s inception. Can you believe that? It’s mad, right?

Not only that, but daytime TV is the only place where you can routinely watch women heading up some of the biggest shows of the day, while live shows in the evening tend to be an estrogen wasteland.

The daytime audience tends to be female-heavy too. It’s interesting then that since the “Daytime” category was created by Bafta a few years ago, the winners have been shows headed up by men (The Great House Giveaway, The Chase, and The Repair Shop: A Royal Visit). All great shows, obviously. But this year, the women of daytime are going in hard.

Both Loose Women and Lorraine are nominated. And if neither of us wins, that’s alright. We’ll wake up Monday morning the same women we were the night before: intelligent and passionate about having an impact in the world. Hopefully, we are helping to nudge the dial for the next generation of female broadcasters too.

Charlene White is a presenter for ITV News and Loose Women