Simply The Best (ITV1); The 20 Quickest Ways To Make Money On Your Property (five) ; The Last Secret of Dr Crippen (C4); Real Life: Children Of The Miners' Strike (ITV1): CAN anyone at ITV really believe that Simply The Best is what's needed to brighten up the struggling Saturday evening schedules?

Viewers have long lost the inclination to watch C-list celebs and members of the public compete in games that involve a lot of running about - and falling over - carrying buckets of water. This is It's a Knockout without the silly costumes, silly props and Eddie Waring. This is simply the pits.

Five should be similarly ashamed of The 20 Quickest Ways To Make Money On Your Property, presided over by new signings Colin McAllister and Justin Ryan, from BBC2's The Million Pound Property Experiment.

These property experts might just as well have called this The 20 Quickest Ways To Make Money Out Of Five. Having been paid (presumably) a large sum of money to change channels, the pair were required to do little but make a few facetious remarks and exchange knowing looks when knobs and knockers were mentioned.

Others, such as House Doctor Ann Maurice and Linda Barker, were there to dish out the advice. Most of this was common sense or a repeat of what we've heard in a thousand TV property shows, from cleaning before receiving prospective buyers to the number one piece of advice - add an extension.

Dr Crippen could have done with expert advice when accused of poisoning his wife Cora. C4's documentary The Last Secret Of Dr Crippen cast doubt on whether he should have been hanged for the crime because of flaws in the case and the inadequacy of the trial.

New evidence produced did indeed cast doubt on the wisdom of executing him, including a remarkable claim that the-then Home Secretary Winston Churchill may have forgotten to pass on a letter, allegedly from Crippen's dead wife, for investigation.

Crippen is one of those figures you think you know all about until a programme like this. Were you aware, for instance, that he was American by birth?

The press played a part in his downfall with the sensational case spawning a popular press, chequebook journalism and the paparazzi. The weekly newspaper John Bull paid for his defence as a means of getting hold of his life story. In court, photographers hid cameras under their hats so they could "steal an image".

Twenty years on, images from the miners' strike still have the power to evoke strong feelings. Perhaps, instead of looking back we should be considering the aftermath on the families whose life depended on the pits.

The heart was ripped out of communities as pits closed and, according to the Real Life documentary, heroin looked a good bet for miners' children facing a bleak future.

We followed mother Donna Marsh who's devoted her life to trying to get son 22-year-old Gary off the drug. "I don't know how to win or how to give up," she said.

Gary, who was waiting for a place in a rehabilitation centre, described an addict's typical day: stealing, selling and score "until you pass out or the shops are shut, whichever comes first".

Donna's despair was heart-breaking but not unique, as we heard of other miners' children who had turned to drugs - "a wasted generation" as they were described.

Published: 19/07/2004