Accession Number

B96

Series Title

CHANGES

Programme Title

POLYTHENE

Producer

Tony Wilkie Miller

Other Credits

Editor: Ken Langston Jones

Transmission Date

10/06/83

b/w & colour, sound (sep), 30 mins 48 secs

Synopsis

Programme on the influence that polythene, or polyethelene, has had on British industry, military, medicine and consumers. Opens with "Changes" series music. The programme contains numerous shots of polythene-wrapped goods and archive footage of factory workers making polythene products. There is also archive footage of the laboratories at Winnington Hall in Northwich, Cheshire where polythene was discovered in 1933 by ICI scientists Gibson and Fawcett. The ICI laboratories are shown in the present day and various staff are interviewed. There is footage of the first programme to be aired on British television from studios at Alexandra Palace, London. The role of polythene in radar systems for the military is featured, and there is footage of RAF bombers in the Falklands. Workers laying polythene-based water pipes are shown and there is archive footage of an advertisement for plastic tupperware. An ex-member of staff from Bakerlite Limited talks of developing polythene products in the 1950s. There are shots of piles of waste polythene bags being incinerated. Various plastic products are shown at the Polymer Library at Lancaster University. Research Designer Arthur Taylor from the Orthapaedic Appliance Unit at the University of Salford is interviewed about the use of polythene in medical equipment and there are shots of moulds being made for the handicapped. A nurse puts a polymer-based neck-brace onto a patient. A scientist from the Department of Polymer Science and Technology at the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST) demonstrates a fire-proof polymer-based fabric. The programme closes with shots of plastic wrappings being made on assembly lines.