Till Death Us Do Part

- Season 4

(1972)

It's the summer of 1970 and voting day for the general election. After casting his vote, staunch conservative Alf Garnett visits his local pub and launches out in a drunken tirade about Harold Wilson and the evils of Labour government.

Rita gives birth to a baby son and Alf, eventually - as he would rather be in the pub wetting the baby's head - goes to visit her in hospital. Initial pride at seeing his grandson soon leads to an argument with Mike, who wants to call his son Michael Patrick - too IRA for Alf, who is also annoyed that the surname will be Rawlins, not Garnett and the christening will take place in a Catholic church.

Alf has received a tax rebate and is celebrating by blowing it in the pub, where he hears about another regular's racing pigeons. Alf believes he is onto a winner by taking up the sport himself and takes a train journey to set the birds free, though inevitably things do not work out as planned.

The Garnetts go to Bournemouth by train, where Alf gets into an argument with an Indian passenger and is aghast to be told that the man is travelling first class. On arrival there is more for him to moan about - sunburn, the taxi driver, though the hotel proprietress with the hen-pecked husband can teach him a thing or two about rabbiting on. Finally a kid plays a trick on him so that he and his deck chair fall into the swimming pool.

Even at the breakfast table Alf is on his high horse, mouthing off about how the government should put looters and thieves up against the wall and shoot them. However, when he gets to work and finds that Else has got her own back on him by putting nothing in his lunch-box, he faces an ethical dilemma. Steal or starve.

Alf wants baby grandson Michael to play for West Ham, and follow in the footsteps of his beloved Bobby Moore. Arrogant Alf whisks baby Michael away to watch 'The Hammers', at Upton Park, but an unpleasant welcome awaits on his return home.

Alf is bed-ridden having slipped on Else's newly-polished floor and broken his leg. Bored with being stuck inside he asks Else to push him in a wheel-chair to the pub but it is too much for her and she gives up. Some lads apparently come to Alf's rescue and take him to his destination but they actually drug his beer so that he passes out after which they paint his face and push him around as a Penny for the Guy.

It's Christmas Eve and Alf still has no present for Else. The black man selling cheap British watches looks like being a life saver but maybe Alf should have held back on the racist insults before buying. On Christmas Day Alf propounds his view that Jesus was English, which the others dispute. However, a meeting in the pub with the cast of 'Jesus Christ Superstar' seems to support Alf's theory.