Britain's Crime Capitals

Always nice to get a photo listing in the Radio Times

At 9pm on Monday 14 April, you can see the first programme in a new series I'm presenting for Channel 5. It's made by twofour productions - responsible for The Hotel Inspector, Educating Yorkshire and Splash, among many other fine shows.

The first episode focuses on Liverpool. Over the course of the series, we also visit Birmingham, Glasgow and Manchester. Each city has its own problems and its own way of dealing with them.

In the armoury

On Monday we visit a police ballistics facility (above) somewhere in England. I was allowed to fire a Glock handgun, using the same hollow point bullets Oscar Pistorious used to kill his girlfriend. 

To demonstrate the damage one of these bullets can do, I fire one into a block of custom-made "ballistics soap", designed to have the same consistency as human muscle. 

Even in a sterile and controlled environment, it's possible to get a sense of the catastrophic injuries these weapons are capable of inflicting on their targets.

I hope you can spare the time to watch or record Britain's Crime Capitals on Monday, or stream it on Demand 5 after transmission.