South

Inside Out went to Thornhill on the outskirts of Southampton to meet the kids getting the blame for many of the estate’s problems.

Thornhill has been labelled ‘deprived’ and has had almost £50m of government cash flooding in to sort out some of its social problems.

However, almost 10 years on, is it working?

The bus company took its night services off the streets and only put them on again when the police agreed to ride shotgun.

Gangs of up to 40 youths were running out of bushes to throw bottles and stones at the vehicles.

Kids even tampered with bus engines so the buses could not move, leaving passengers sitting targets while windows were smashed around them.

Inside Out Presenter Joe Crowley said: “I was staggered by the number of people who turned out and the strength of feeling. It was clear this was something we had to look into.

“Residents were eager to speak out over how difficult the gangs of youths had made life on the estate and we were keen to get inside the heads of the kids they were talking about.”

Inside Out asks just how bad are these youngsters? Are they really hardened thugs or just bored teenagers?

Members jailed

The wannabe gangsters claim to be members of the Thornhill Boyz and one teenager told us why the gang holds such allure.

Earlier this year, nine members were jailed for nearly 30 years for a firebomb attack against members of a rival gang.

On the estate we learn there’s a pecking order and that the bus attacks are almost a rite of passage for the younger ones – one that our lad has already gone through.

“I remember when I was younger, when the bus first got ambushed, there was about forty of us… the bus got to the middle of the hill and there were 20 people on each side with rocks, bottles, lobbing everything. Every window was smashed on the bus. It was mental.

“Now everyone thinks it has calmed down because there are police on the buses and following the buses. It will happen again. Of course, it will happen again.”

The teenagers we met will soon have to decide whether to leave gang life behind or go the same way as those Thornill Boyz currently behind bars.

One teenager said “When you get older I think you will come out of the generation of gang [life] but you will always be a Thornhill Boy. Always.

"Throughout your whole life it will always be there.

“I know people who are 60 year olds and still stand there and say I am a Thornhill boy.”

Trigger fish

Later in the programme scientist Lisa Chilton finds about one of the strangest looking fish in British waters.

Anglers and divers began seeing the fish in western and southwestern coastal waters over a dozen years ago.

Now it is turning up further east along the Channel – and in increasing numbers.

Effect of warming?

According to Ken Collins of the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton, warmer winter as well as summer seas may be encouraging it to make its home here.

"It's a bit of a bully," says Ken Collins, as the trigger fish sees off other, bigger inhabitants of its tank by raising the double fin on its head – the "trigger" that gives this species its name.

"It certainly seems to think it's got the right to have first helpings of any food."

Spectacular underwater footage gives viewers a chance to see shoals of trigger fish and their unusual behaviour.