Television

SATURDAY

Viewers who witnessed the crimes Hale and Pace committed in ITV's reading of Dalziel and Pascoe (8.05pm BBC1) may well approach the latest screen version of Reginald Hill's double-act detectives with suspicion. They need not fear too much, however. For a start, Warren Clarke and Colin Buchanan - who play the title roles - are proper actors. Secondly, the books have been adapted for television by Alan Plater and Malcolm Bradbury. The antagonistic relationship between old-school "I call a spade a spade" Dalziel (Clarke) and sociology graduate Pascoe (Buchanan) is nicely realised. "We university graduates do our homework, don't we?" Dalziel sneers at his partner during the investigation in tonight's opening episode. "A Clubbable Woman", adapted by Plater, kicks off with dirty deeds down at the local rugby club.

SUNDAY

What impells a grown man to drive 1.4 million miles around Britain, clocking up 11 written-off cars and two divorces in the process? The answer is bird-watching, the compulsion put on the couch in "Twitchers," the first in a new series of Encounters (8pm C4). Lee Evans (no, not that one), the aforementioned long-distance driver, has his pager always by his side updating him on the latest sightings as he tears round the country attempting to "tick" such rare birds as a chestnut-sided warbler. As Evans himself concedes: "When other twitchers think you are mad, then you know you really are mad."

MONDAY

This Life (9.45pm BBC2), a new 11-part serial, can be described with all those adjectives beginning with "S" - smart, sassy, streetwise. Screenwriter Amy Jenkins, 29, trained as a City solicitor, which gave her ample material for this, her first commission. The drama focuses on the private lives of five twentysomething lawyers who share a house, and features enough sex and swearing to cause all lines from Tunbridge Wells to Television Centre to be blocked.

TUESDAY

The week after one epic serial about life in the north in the Sixties, BBC2's Our Friends in the North, ends, another, And the Beat Goes On (10pm C4), begins. On the evidence of the first episode, the latter may suffer by comparison with the former. Channel 4's big spring drama follows in the footsteps of its soap (Brookside) and junior soap (Hollyoaks) - it's set in the north-west (Liverpool) and made by Phil Redmond's Mersey Telelvision. Wannabe rock star Ritchie O'Rourke (Danny McCall) is more familiar with his own body than that of his girlfriend, Cathy (Katy Carmichael), but she is nevertheless pregnant. Meanwhile, undergraduate Christine Spencer (Lisa Faulkner) is tossing up for a boyfriend between a fellow student and her tutor. You know it's a period drama because virtually everybody smokes.

WEDNESDAY

Dispatches (9pm C4) presents a depressing report on inertia within the motor industry, which is delaying the introduction of safety features which could help save hundreds of lives each year.

THURSDAY

The latest sacred cow to be led to the slaughter-house marked Reputations (9pm BBC2) is Joy Adamson. Behind the caring image created by Born Free, the conservationist is said to have had a pretty torrid private life. Kenyan ex-pat society called her "the Viennese alley-cat".