To The Manor Born (ITV1) : ENTERTAINING as it was, I'm not sure this documentary, set among the landed gentry and their cap-doffing workers on a vast Suffolk country estate, did anything to alter preconceptions of such people.

All the participants conformed to the cliched image we have of them.

The elderly lord of the manor was a staunch traditionalist advocating old-fashioned values. His wife was immaculately groomed and sensible and you wondered how she'd put up with the old goat for so long.

Their son and heir had rebelled against the family tradition by opening a Middle Eastern restaurant in London. Their three daughters seemed required to breed in between trying various fashionable jobs.

And the workers on the estate were ruddy-faced men (and women) who'd never had a day off work in their life and had more common sense than the entire family put together. As Bill Hook, who's farmed there for 40 years, said: "People interpret a plum in the mouth for intelligence".

As we joined the Somerleytons, Lady Belinda was playing referee in the "considerable stand-off" between husband Lord Somerleyton (aka Savile Crossley, or Bill to his friends) and 30-year-old son Hugh over the handing over of responsibility for the estate.

Some idea of Hugh's attitude to life may be gleaned from his decision to spend £3,000 on a tent used in the film Lawrence Of Arabia so he could hire it out for Bohemian weddings. This does not bode well for when he takes over the £30m, 3,000 acre estate in a year's time.

Lady Somerleyton has decided enough is enough. She wants her 74-year-old husband to retire, move out of the big house, and let Hugh take over the running of the place.

His lordship isn't too keen on giving up the family business to a son who doesn't necessarily subscribe to the idea of traditional values in running an place that's remained financially viable by opening its doors to the public.

It wasn't only his son he didn't want to take over. A tenant farmer had to fight to convince Lord Somerleyton to let him pass on the farm to his own son.

Bill sees himself as the "custodian of heritage", whose job is to maintain the Somerleyton tradition to hand on to his son. Letting his daughters in on the act is something that apparently doesn't enter his mind. His whole attitude to children is shaped by the notion that they "should be frightened of their parents - that's what's wrong today, not enough people are frightened of their parents."

I couldn't help but agree with Bill Hook's comment that "I don't envy the son".

Published: 01/05/2003