TV Guide: New Scotland Yard (1972-74)
New Scotland Yard is a police procedural drama series made by LWT in the early 1970s. It bridged the gap between the tame, “traditional” Dixon of Dock Green and the much more gritty and “realistic” The Sweeney. The latter is lauded today, but isn’t my kind of thing. In fact the police genre doesn’t tend to appeal to me at all. And yet, I love New Scotland Yard, which straddled that televisual transition between different ways of depicting the British police. It has elements of both, and to some extent they are embodied by its two main characters.
Those are detectives Chief Superintendent John Kingdom (played by the charming John Woodvine) and his assistant Inspector Alan Ward (played with delicious malevolence by John Carlisle).
They work in CID, the division of “the Met” that handles serious crime. Each episode sees them getting posted to a local police station somewhere around London, setting up shop there and investigating the case, and ends with them cheerfully leaving to return to HQ - a crime solved.
While Kingdom is a very straightforward man, Ward is complex: affable yet sinister, intellectual yet vicious, effeminate yet violent, eccentric yet intolerant, sympathetic to Communism yet racist. I think Carlisle was five or ten years too old for the character, but he’s so fun to watch, it really doesn’t matter.
The two men get along but don’t really like each other. There is tension because Ward is younger, arrogant and likes to cut corners, and seems to have joined the police thinking it would be a chance to beat up scumbags, whereas Kingdom, while older, embodies the “new” policing of the era: bureaucratic, thorough, methodical, scientific, and absolutely “by the book”.
Kingdom and Ward are the only regular characters. There is a small number of semi-regulars: Kingdom’s wife Angela (played by Sally Home), her suave journalist brother Harry Carson, Sergeant Bates, Constable Thomas, WDC Fry, coroner Dr Cobb and journalist Phillip Barkis. Each of these appears only a few times. I would have liked to see far more of Carson, an intriguing character well-played by Barry Warren, but sadly he disappears after the first season.
But these supporting characters are just that. The focus is on the people unique to each episode - the criminals and victims, their friends and relatives and colleagues. What is great about New Scotland Yard is how well-drawn and engaging these many characters are. This is clearly a priority for the show as it takes time to develop each one, through scenes that would nowadays be considered “padding” but which give the show its soul, and also through the deciphering done by Kingdom. He is firm but sympathetic, and he often solves a crime by coming to understand the people involved.
What’s more, there is often a surprising amount of depth in the dialogue. This is civilised drama, before “realism” came in and persuaded us that ordinary people are inarticulate, ignorant and uncouth.
There is nothing unusual or avant-garde in New Scotland Yard; it’s just good “meat and potatoes” storytelling, reliable from one episode to the next, with a bit of depth, and a lot of cosiness in the production. It was in the standard mode of the time: video in studio, film on location. In keeping with LWT’s house style, the emphasis is on studio material, but there is plenty of real vintage London to savour. We get a delightful snapshot of the capital at that time - a place, a world, a whole way of life, that is gone now.
For some ungodly reason the producers decided to “shake things up” after three seasons, so the fourth revolves around a different pair of detectives. Played by Michael Turner and Clive Francis, they are sadly much less enjoyable. There is one good episode in that season, though, and I will include it.
You can’t really go wrong with this show. In the first three seasons, every episode is good. The characterisation is sometimes a bit clunky, and the stories occasionally a bit far-fetched, but nothing ruinous. Even the fourth season is still solid storytelling - if you can do without Kingdom and Ward.
Recommended episodes
Point of Impact
A leftist political demo leads to a police officer being accused of murder. The tussle between the leftists and the reactionary counter-movement (“the Law & Order Brigade”) is interesting from a 2020s perspective, as is their mutual distrust of the police. Also intriguing is the show’s treatment of the accused officer, who would nowadays be diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome.
The Come Back
This is atmospheric and tense. Kenneth Cranham (Dr Channard!) plays a vicious young psychopath with a devoted, kindly old mother who is desperate not to see the truth about her son. Very good scenes with her.
The Palais Romeo
An interesting story about a young man with a thing for older women. I really like the handling of that character. The storyline made me realise that, in some ways, London back then was similar to a provincial town, in that people (White, English people) had community gatherings, dances and so on. It is different now, a city of much more isolated, atomised individuals.
Also, I adore the police station set in this one, especially the “bedroom” with its nook for handbasins! This is a much less wealthy London than we know today, so its rooms are dingy but often spacious - a combination I love.
Hard Contract
An angry middle-aged man realises that his employee is a contract killer and decides to take advantage. It’s all a bit far-fetched but the episode works, because the characters’ motivations are explained. It makes sense. This is a great example of the show taking time to deliver a satisfying story.
Perfect in Every Way
An engaging story about a precocious young man. There is interesting psychological stuff with him and his parents, culminating with a beautifully-done interrogation scene.
And again I love the police station set. It’s a distinctive structure with half-storeys and wood partitions. We don’t see the outside of it but I always imagine it being something like this. I don’t know how sets like this could be hammered together for just a single 50-minute production, which, as far as they knew, would only ever be watched once!
Reunion
A pleasing story about an escaped convict who runs into just the right woman to help him. Their interaction is touching, and the woman (a resourceful oddball played by Sharon Duce) is a lot of fun. I love the atmospherics of the lawyers’ office with the nightclub next door. All in studio, the effect is achieved so simply - ambient sound and lighting, with a slowly flashing neon sign “outside” the window.
Nothing to Live For
A fast-moving and gripping story about love, betrayal and humiliation. Terrific performances from Philip Madoc and Lynn Farleigh. (The latter actually later married the lead John Woodvine, and they remained together until his death 53 years after this episode was made.)
A Gathering of Dust
An unusual story about a long-buried past being accidentally uncovered. The first 20 minutes involve Kingdom and Ward being trapped in an underground room with a dead body. They spend the time looking for clues. I thought the entire episode was going to be like this, and they would actually have solved the case by the time they got rescued! Alas, LWT were not quite that adventurous. But still, it’s a good episode.
Shadow of a Deadbeat
This might be my favourite episode. It’s grim but touching. Great atmospherics, largely achieved with ambient sound. The sterile modern underground garage contrasts with the derelict house. I love the latter - very nicely done.
The opening scene shows an argument between two alcoholic tramps. It’s one of those cases where the performances are so engaging, and the camera/director so unintrusive, you could quite happily watch the conversation for ages. I’d like to know more about them, how they live, what they’re hoping for, etc. Sadly we only get a few minutes of them bickering and then the storyline begins. It’s a storyline that doesn’t work out well for either of them.
There’s a beautiful, layered performance from Richard Mathews (pictured) as the tragic but humorous Danny Pearce, and also an amusing turn by David Webb as a snooty security guard.
A technical note: yes, the derelict house is over-lit, but that was a necessity due to the Plumbicon camera technology of the time (the EMI-2001). But it doesn’t detract at all. Another curious thing is that, but for two (studio) shots of the outside of the derelict house, there are no exterior scenes whatsoever; the story is told entirely “indoors”.
The Money Game
A charming relationship between a middle-aged man and woman, two divorcees just trying their luck with an amateur crime while wondering whether to get together for their old age. It’s really endearing. Derek Smith (also of The Guardians and The Boy Merlin) is always a pleasure to watch. There is also some surprising comedy, with Ward going undercover and having to act normal. This is one of only two episodes written by the show’s script editor, Basil Dawson.
We Do What We Can
A well-meaning man is sucked back into a life of crime, but redeemed by his courageous wife. A gripping story with Stanley Lebor as a rather terrifying villain. There is a sub-plot which is clearly there to bolster the emotional punch of the main plot, but is sadly under-developed so not really successful, but still, you will get the point.
Hoax
Two hoaxes play out simultaneously, but one involves Ward and the other might not be a hoax but a deadly game. There is an interesting role played by a very young Michael Kitchen. Observe how polite various people are to each other! A display of good English manners, still prevalent in 1972. This episode is also the only glimpse we get into Ward’s personal life (he lives with his mother and is apparently loveless).
My Boy Robby?
The star of this is not Dennis Waterman (immediately pre-Sweeney) as a young rapist but Bernard Kay as his vicious father. There is also a good turn by Avril Elgar as a strident spinster and John Savident as a smug solicitor. This episode also contains the show’s only reference to lesbianism, and rather chauvinistically casts it as a result of male cruelty towards women. That aside, there is something adorably twee and “safe” about the idea of two young women living together in the early ‘70s and taking refuge in their feelings for each other. Subversive, no doubt, yet still so much more innocent than the equivalents on TV today.
Where’s Harry?
Similar to Reunion, this sees an escaped convict finding comfort with a kind woman. The characters and storyline are very different, though. Here the convict is played by Derek Newark, an effective character actor also seen in Rising Damp and Doctor Who. The relationship whose promise we see emerging between him and the woman is a really sweet one - you can easily imagine them getting married and loving each other forever. This episode also has a criminal kingpin played quite chillingly by Barry Jackson.
Bullet in a Haystack
An interesting episode in that an impending crime is discovered by accident while a completely separate crime is investigated. Features a nice performance by Sam Kydd as a seasoned pickpocket. He plays Cutler as a wily working-class Londoner, in a way that feels historical in 2025; you would probably encounter exactly this kind of chap daily back then, but they are all gone now.
Weight of Evidence
An unusual episode in that we see the crime taking place but are left wondering whether it has been correctly remembered by a witness (and us), with a man’s fate hanging in the balance. The question is only answered at the very end. Features a surprising early performance by Bob Hoskins and a disgustingly villainous turn by George Innes.
Property, Dogs & Women
The nearest thing to a “Christmas” episode. This again has a lovely police station set, and I like the interaction between Kingdom and the boy Jimmy, played with gusto by the actor who, a decade later, would play Mickey Pearce in Only Fools and Horses.
All the episodes show a London that is gone forever, but perhaps this one most of all.
Jimmy is an archetype that was extinct by the year 2000 - the Cockney street urchin, the lad from the wrong side of the tracks, but he means well, the cheeky chappie who has an answer for everything and the Irish “gift of the gab” (and indeed the actor was of Irish descent), full of bravado and needs guidance to keep him on the straight and narrow. Throughout the centuries there must have been thousands upon thousands of boys just like that, all over London. But there are no Jimmys today. The influxes have been too diverse for the archetype to withstand, and it has been dissolved and washed away.
Aside from Jimmy, this episode also gives a real sense of a particular community in some little corner of London - a community with its own characters, conventions and arrangements. It is a certainty that this community, with all of its unique aspects, would be annihilated by the demographic upheaval London saw in the decades that followed.
Pier
This has an intriguing and unusual character in the suspect, nicely written and played. At this time TV writers were still getting to grips with the reality of young people taking recreational drugs, but I think in this case, although the portrayed effects of marijuana are laughably inaccurate, the phenomenon is handled well. Depicting the experience of intoxication is also the only time the show veers into experimentalism, with some rather “far out” visual effects. In addition, the scenes of interrogation by Kingdom are riveting. When you see this, it’s depressing to know it’s the final episode with him, the last time you’ll see him wrapping his mind around a case, around a suspect. He really is a great character, a proper patriarch, played reassuringly by Woodvine.
For All Their Faults
From the fourth season, this sees a man accused of a heinous crime. We are kept guessing until the very end.
Episodes depicting homosexuality
We Do What We Can
Where’s Harry?
My Boy Robby? (lesbianism)
Diamonds Are Never Forever
The Stone
Episodes depicting recreational drugs
Ask No Questions (heroin)
Pier (marijuana)
Episodes set outside London
Evidence of Character (a Home Counties village)
Papa Charlie (countryside, various towns)
Pier (Margate)
Come-Back (West Country)
Episodes depicting race relations
Among 46 episodes only one depicts race relations, which goes to show how much less diverse, and more harmonious, British society was back then. Nonetheless, the episode - A Case of Prejudice - is loaded with a political agenda. None of the other 45 episodes are like this.
We see a London whose police are still just beginning to grapple with diversity, and have various ideas about Black men.
Ward says things which would nowadays get a police officer sacked on the spot. Kingdom, the sage patriarch, teaches that wisdom means putting stereotypes aside so as to be objective about people, and also being aware that they are subject to other people’s stereotyping of them, including subtle treatment betraying prejudice (what we would now call “microaggressions”), and they will behave accordingly (what we would now call “acting out” due to “the racism of low expectations”).
In turn, Ward accuses Kingdom of what we would now call “positive discrimination”. This offends Kingdom since he aims to be strictly impartial, unswayed by what we would now call “political correctness” and certainly not beset by a “White saviour complex”.
Later, Kingdom receives wisdom from a Black activist: we all have prejudice, even those of us who believe ourselves free of it (we would now say “unconscious bias”). The key is to be aware of this (“mindful”) and, in Kingdom’s defiant words, “fight it, control it, eliminate it”. We would now say “check our privilege” and “fight for equity”.
All of these concepts were yet to be named, but present and discussed in 1972. It is fascinating to see all of it in embryo, being presented to the British public for the first time.
When the police (of course) discover that the murderer was a White man, not a Black man, Kingdom rebukes Ward: “You have a whole vocabulary of insulting looks and remarks reserved for people with a black skin that does you no credit”.
Kingdom then gives a dressing down to a young unemployed racist (describing him as beset by “impotence and inferiority”), and then to his Svengali, a middle-aged middle-class White racist who runs an organisation “Anti-Black Action”. Finally, he encourages a Black playwright to persevere with his activism, saying that, when it comes to changing society, “it’s never too late”.
The message could not be more clear, shrill or self-castrating: White people who have any objections to Black immigration are hateful, insecure and ignorant, Black men are no more violent than White men, and the enlightened attitude is to treat everyone equally and to labour against prejudice, especially within ourselves.
However, given what we now know about the relative criminality of Black men and White men (including within London specifically), Kingdom’s “wisdom” seems naive and Ward’s “prejudice” seems more likely the product of observation and common sense, which Kingdom is diligently educating himself out of. But he had the luxury to do so, back in 1972, because his kind were still the overwhelming majority of London’s population.
Whenever I watch New Scotland Yard, I find myself pondering a question both painfully obvious and painfully pertinent: “What would a man like John Kingdom think of the capital today…?”
As an addendum… 53 years after this episode was made, the Met police still hasn’t got to grips with Black men! The process of self-questioning advocated by this episode is a never-ending one, putting native English people in the dock in perpetuity.
Episodes depicting Kingdom’s problems
The scripts occasionally venture into the “inner turmoil” of the lead character, mainly concerning his rocky marriage. I think the show could do without this, but it is done quite well, and gives rise to some touching moments between Kingdom and his wife.
The Palais Romeo
Perfect in Every Way
Papa Charlie
Monopoly
Pier
Related to this is Kingdom occasionally voicing doubt about his job. At one point we even hear him decrying modern society as “lousy” and questioning why young people shouldn’t commit crime given the chances they are allotted. Coming from a man like him this kind of thing is intriguing so in a way you want more of it, but I don’t think it “helps” the show. I want Kingdom to be a rock-solid patriarch, an authority figure - always reliable, on the side of good, and solving problems - not a “flawed and realistic” character. The show flirting with this kind of thing is an example of it straddling two eras, and I think many would now agree that the earlier era was, even if naive and simplistic, the healthier one.
Technical curiosities
Shadow of a Deadbeat - entirely shot on video, in studio.
Papa Charlie - entirely shot on film, on location. (The two episodes are consecutive so I wonder if the directors struck an agreement, one using the other’s allocation of film.) This contrast shows how different the same actors can seem in the two paradigms: video/studio/multi-camera and film/location/single-camera. Also, this episode is surprisingly gritty and brutal.
Nothing to Live For - location shooting done on video (“OB”), unusual for the time. I couldn’t see a reason for it until a scene came up that used both location and studio footage, then it made sense for the sake of visual unity.
What I would have liked
Just more of the same. More, more, more. This is a perfect example of a formula that worked very well and didn’t need changing. I’d love to have seen Kingdom and Ward up against the evolving society of the 1970s as the decade progressed. I don’t know what the producers were thinking in replacing them after three seasons.
But maybe Woodvine himself decided to hang up the cuffs. This popular TV show would have been regular work and well-paid, but perhaps not what a Shakespearean actor wanted to be doing in his prime years. However, for all his prodigious output, upon his death he was most noted for a rather unremarkable turn in the Hollywood movie An American Werewolf in London. As for Carlisle, he enjoyed prominence on TV once more in The Omega Factor (1979) but never again after that, perhaps because he too was a Shakespearean actor and preferred the stage. I also suspect his style was too “clipped” and “theatrical” as naturalism took over TV in the ‘80s.
Laments aside, we do have 39 highly enjoyable episodes and I recommend them most heartily, not just as engaging “police procedurals” but as a delightful record of a bygone era - in terms of both London life, and British television-making.
RIP actor John Woodvine, 21st July 1929 - 6th October 2025.
RIP actor John Carlisle, 6th September 1935 – 7th December 2011.
RIP producer Rex Firkin, 3rd July 1926 - 7th December 2014.
RIP script editor Basil Dawson, 2nd April 1914 - 19th April 1979.
See my other TV guides here.
I now find myself unable to watch old British TV or films, because of the overwhelming grief I feel at seeing the country we have lost.
I will check these out for sure, thank you for the suggestion. God bless Britain.