Police Camera Action

I managed to catch Police Camera Action the other night on ITV1 thinking it was a repeat. Then good old Big Al' popped up to do a link not from a service station or a police car as per usual, but a TV Studio, laid out with a wall of screens playing a loop of traffic cams and the new Police Camera Action logo on screen. The show consisted of narration from someone whos name escapes me, but was more in the style of Traffic Cops (BBC 1). Ofcourse re arranged music was provided by David Lowe, but just wondered how long this new series has been running for, and what people think of the change to the format.

It was rebranded last year I think to fit in the 10pm half hour slot on ITV1 before News at Ten returned.

Big Al isn't the main commentator anymore - Adrian Simpson is.

Yup, I think Alistair lost the opportunity to be at the forefront of PCA after that drink driving charge in 2003...

Indeed so, as good as it is to have PCA back with Al, it isn't the same, there's fewer clips, and its more like a Drving rehab course presented by Adrian Simpson.

Also Al's catchphrase at the end doesn't work either, it's something like "Lets drive safe out there..." Pot calling the kettle black me thinks..

lets drive safely out there

you mean driving down the motorway whilst doing a piece to camera

very safe

As I mentioned, Big Al is now shoved in a studio to do pieces to camera, leaving a roving reporter type to do the voiceover and the like.

I remember a classic PCA from 1997 I think where Al had his first drink drive charge and he had to admit his own faults while introducing a topic on the issue. Of course, I think it was must watch TV back then. It's been on ITV4.

I think it was either the first or second episode of PCA that was made, I've only seen it once (when they started showing PCA on Men & Motors) and Al was rather apologetic.

By chance that episode has just been on ITV4 this morning, the main word said was regret. Just a shame he did it again.

Think it was a bit later than that, during the early era where the whole tone of the programme was so deadly serious. Shortly afterwards it started to adopt a more light-hearted tone with some really rather witty observations of how people were driving. By the 2002 episodes it had gone back to a more serious tone and Alistair started dressing up formally again after many years of informal dress.

Of course his drink-driving conviction in 2003 put paid to Police Camera Action, until it was relaunched last year. The relaunch has its own merits but its not PCA as it used to be and its suffering from modern diseases such as backing music, clip-cropping and filler-fodder material that generally implies that if you're watching this programme you're not driving appropriately.

Could be said Al was a little bit of an inconvenience for the show, because come 2003 the unaired series from 2002 had to be delayed for four years to be aired on ITV4, ITV1 losing a series of a Primetime show to the graveyard shift on a digital channel!

The series was not delayed for four years, where have you got this from?
ITV4 started airing PCA at around its time of launch, though it had been seen on Men & Motors beforehand. ITV1 had already seemingly dropped the show long before Alastair Stewart's drink-driving case came to court in July 2003 and long before the episodes were scheduled, though they'd clearly been made.

According to the original transmission dates from Wiki (pinch of salt, I know) , the last episode before the current series aired on ITV1 in January 2002. The remaining episodes turned up on ITV4 four years later as part of the repeat run. One can only wonder why the episodes had been ordered but not shown originally, especially as Stewart wouldn't get dropped from the show for another eighteen months. Intriguing.