Skint, Channel Four.

I watched the first ten minutes of this last week. I didn’t even get to the first ad- break, because I know how the story goes. It’s a Shameless and Marv the junkie and Bullet the dog package that shows things might be bad with unemployment, poverty, crime and neglect, but that’s just my story, at least I’m not on television making-do. So here we had the junkie ‘shoppers’, nicking things for Dean Bell his wife and extended family of children and stepchildren. Dean’s good at getting- by. He’s a former steel worker and a cheeky chappie that likes to go on the piss when he’s got a chance. His families on benefits and he doesn’t work. Daily Mail howls of outrage. Why aren’t the children half-naked and foraging like Stig of the Dump for snails and gruel and other nice things to eat? They are clean and look well behaved, which ironically works against their stepdad. Better they were dirty and underfed. That would also work against him, but would be perhaps more photogenic. No Bullet yet, but the Tory party are working on it. It’s easier to deal with images of kids on push bikes and motorbikes that hog the camera and want to show how tough and delinquent they are. Connor loves the camera and the celebrity and is shown telling his mum to fuck off out of his room and smashing something. His mother admits she can’t cope with him. I had to admit I couldn’t either. He’s a right little bastard, expelled from school, and we all know where he’s going to end up and it’s definitely not going to be working in the steelworks. Smash the camera Connor, smash the camera.