Big brother in a small world

Big Brother contestants feel destined for even bigger things. But there is no such thing as easy money, says Dermot Bolger

Big Brother Channel 4 / E4, nightly
The Story of ITV: The People's Channel UTV, 10.40pm, Sunday
Frontline Football BBC2, 11.20pm, Monday
Tenants from Hell UTV Monday 9pm

In his 1941 Irish language satirical classic, An Beal Bocht, Flann O'Brien set down the rule that not only must all Gealgores visiting Corca Dorcha speak fluent Gaelic, but their only topic of conversation must be about themselves speaking fluent Gaelic. Sixty-four years later, the same limited discourse has invaded the mindset of the rather lost souls who comprise the current crop of housemates on Big Brother (Channel 4 and E4, nightly). A needy and weedy bunch, their sole preoccupation – when not enduring banal tasks – appears to be talking about how Big Brother will change their lives.

On Sunday, one contestant, whose ordinary occupation is answering a telephone, explained how she will never be able to return to work because every caller would instantly recognise her voice and name (which she will probably have to change) from the programme. "But not everyone will know your name," a fellow contestant said, gently trying to burst her bubble. "What do you mean?" she asked, utterly baffled at such a thought. "What do you mean everyone won't know my name?" Alas I can't remember her name, but watch out; she may be appearing at a call centre near you shortly.

Civilisation did not crumble with the advent of Big Brother, anymore than it crumbled with the advent of what, 50 years ago, the BBC's Director General called the "potential social menace of the highest order" of commercial television. When most Britons abandoned the church organ recitals favoured by the BBC during World War Two to tune into enemy broadcasts of Lord Haw Haw, the BBC should have noted the bored public's appetite for competition and variety. However, it took a decade of peace and several various bizarre and doom-filled parliamentary debates before a 1954 act allowed for commercial television.

Last Sunday, ITV wheeled in Melvyn Bragg to blow its own trumpet about its first 50 years of broadcasting in The Story of ITV: The People's Channel (UTV, 10.40pm, Sunday). This was a quick gallop through five decades of self-praise, from the opening ceremony in 1955 when Britain's Postmaster General described the relationship between BBC and ITV as that of "the favoured elder child and the lively youngster". Like favoured elder children elsewhere, the BBC tried to strangle the lively youngster at birth by killing off the character of Grace Archer on radio to the shock of the public on the night ITV was launched.

An attention grabbing stunt, it wasn't going to deflect the new regional broadcasting dynasties springing up, from the ritzy Lou Grade in London to the hard-nosed, straight talking Bernstein brothers who developed Granada in the North. If the BBC rested in the hands of old England, entrepreneurs like the Bernsteins were often emigrants (Latvian Jews in their case) with a different mind-set. It's nice to see how sibling rivalry never dies, with the favoured elder child and the lively youngster at 50 still kicking each other's shins and squabbling.

However, if you want to see really bad blood then attend a football match in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In its previous incarnation as Zaire, this African nation won the hearts of football lovers around the globe in the World Cup finals over 20 years ago. That was before a name-change and several million deaths during the endless wars in this mineral rich (and in every other sense poor) state. Frontline Football (BBC2, 11.20pm, Monday) follows the fortunes of countries embroiled in political and civil turmoil as they try to qualify for the 2006 World Cup. This week the intrepid Ben Anderson spent some weeks with a French coach given the impossible task of trying to prepare a team in Congo to play against South Africa. With the country crippled by war, the best training pitch available was a dusty uneven strip of dried grass, made worse by the fact of UN helicopters landing on the centre circle.

The coach took his 19 players to train in France – a high-risk strategy because two quickly vanished and never to be seen again – with emigration police watching every move the others made. Back in Congo, amid the chaos of secret police and nets with so many gaping holes that the balls went straight through them, somehow he performed the second most amazing miracle possible – he got a result against South Africa. When Ben Anderson left him he had not however performed the ultimate miracle, which was to get paid the wages he was due for months of work.

Maybe there is no such thing as easy money, as landlords on Tenants from Hell (UTV, 9pm, Monday) discovered. Finding your house utterly defaced or turned into a brothel are the little surprises that bank managers rarely mention when encouraging people to enter the buy-to-let market. If Lou Grade or the Bernstein brothers were still active, they would release this series on video to would-be investors. It might cause an even greater shock than the death of Grace Archer.

Dermot Bolger's new novel is The Family on Paradise Pier