Trama

Political ambition and corrupt business clash with the real lives of teenagers on a British council estate in this contemporary conspiracy thriller.

Middlesbrough; sometime soon. Mayoral Candidate Ronnie Lord is on the verge of victory because of his popular stance on law and order and anti-social behaviour. His tough solutions are backed by the public; he's a 'local lad' and knows what he's talking about. But Ronnie has yet to play his trump card; a groundbreaking law and order initiative that would see every young person between the ages of 11 and 17 'tagged' and surveyed 24 hours a day. Ronnie hopes that the proposal will seal his victory while the secretive businessmen, Harris and Bridges, hope that the production of these surveillance devices will seal their fortunes. There's much at stake. And Harris and Bridges demand that Ronnie is above reproach, that he's seen to be 'whiter than white,' that there'll be no scandal to bring him down. And there isn't....not, that is, until his daughter, Sabrina, falls in love with 'Grangetown Lad,' Carl, whose best mate, Mark, has just been murdered in a drugs feud. What Harris and Bridges don't know is that Carl is just an ordinary lad trying to make a good reputation in a bad area. They don't know and they don't care. They know they have to act to preserve Ronnie's reputation and their own profit and so sanction a series of events that lead to more murder and chaos. It's against all this that Carl and Sabrina's love has to survive.—Ian Dowson