Smart Spenders (BBC1): THIS is the sort of programme that makes you endorse the order given to the BBC as part of its charter renewal to stop making copycat shows.

Not only is Smart Spenders awful but rips off another BBC series - the one in which Alvin Hall dishes out financial advice - which makes the crime even worse.

Hidden away among daytime TV, Smart Spenders might get away with it. Exposed in the full glare of the peaktime schedules, it's a disgrace.

Money expert and thrift author Jane Furnival was assigned to sort out the finances of Dave and Jane Byrne. The music and the filming angles used to herald her arrival were attempts to turn her into the financial equivalent of fearsome American House Doctor, Ann Maurice.

Jane, though, is plain boring and her advice pretty useless. The only tip I took away was that rubbing your teeth with lemon rind makes them sparkle, and saves £40 a month on professional whitening methods.

Fireman Dave and shopaholic Jane were a hopeless cause. Her shopping trips, love of make-up and cosmetic surgery left her penniless at the end of each month. Dave had even sold his sports car to pay for her boob job. "He's a soft touch," said Jane about Dave, although she might just as well have been referring to her new breasts.

Presenter Jane's solution to stop the other Jane spending was to make her wear a jumper bearing the slogan DON'T SELL THIS WOMAN ANYTHING as a means of curtailing her lunchtime shopping trips. She took away her store card and limited her to two items of toiletries, something that made Jane feel physically sick.

Dave, meanwhile, continued to drive his car instead of keeping his promise to use one of the two unused bicycles in the garage. He persisted in buying pre-prepared meals when making his own would be more economic.

He really didn't enter into the spirit of the economy drive, ridiculing the home-made birthday card given to him by his partner.

A sale of the couple's unwanted goods raised £135 at a car boot sale. By the end of the experiment, presenter Jane claimed to have saved them £600 a month, although the programme offered scant evidence to prove this.

It was too busy showing Jane saving on shampoo by washing her hair in homemade egg shampoo - and ending up with bits of dried egg in her hair. The other Jane, who'd suggested the idea, was left with egg on her face.

My suggestion for the BBC saving a bit of money is simple: don't make any more Smart Spenders programmes.

Published: 31/03/2005