Behind the bright lights and bustling streets, Britain's cities are also home to some of the country's biggest criminals. Britain's Underworld lifts the lid on the crime lords who have flourished in Britain's roughest, toughest cities - from the 1950's pettysafe blowers to the drug kingpins of the nineties. With every generation throwing up a new batch of gangsters, drug smugglers and ruthless thugs, in this 6-part collection we meet the men determined to make crime pay and the police force dedicated to stop them.

In Glasgow brutal gangland hits and a lethal turf war was conducted by ice-cream van drivers. In 1980's Liverpool Scouse villains started to import cannabis, heroin and cocaine on an unprecedented scale. Manchester saw a deadly battle played out on its streets, earning it the nickname 'Gunchester' in the eighties. In Costa Del Crime, due to an extradition loophole left open until the mid-80s, the coasts of Spain were a hotbed of British criminal talent. The dream of the new towns of Essex turned sour as crime spilled out of London's East End into the beaches, streets and nightclubs. Finally, in Dublin we examine the evolution of the Dublin criminal underworld from armed robberies to kidnapping and bombings.

Contains subtitles.