Notes on a scandal: Britain's Libor rate debacle

TV editor Lyndall Crisp selects Bankers: Fixing the System as her pick of the week on pay television.

Bankers: Fixing the System looks at the role of people like former Barclays chief executive Bob Diamond in the Libor scandal.

TV editor Lyndall Crisp selects Bankers: Fixing the System as her pick of the week on pay television.

Bankers: Fixing the System
Sunday, 6.40pm, BBC World News

Little wonder the Brits are so disillusioned with their banking system. This three-part series picks apart what went wrong last year when the Libor (the obscure rate-setting mechanism) scandal broke, ensnaring Barclays, the Royal Bank of Scotland and UBS. Turns out all three pillars of the establishment were manipulating the rate and pocketing the profits. Never mind their clients. As US Commodity Futures Trading Commission chairman Gary Gensler says, "It's massive. There's $US300 trillion of contracts based on it [the Libor rate]. Let me repeat: it's $US300 trillion of contracts. That's about six times the world economy." This brilliant documentary takes a forensic look at the corporate bloodbath that followed and particularly the role of the former darling of the British and US banking industries and group chief executive of Barclays, Bob Diamond. It includes interviews with leading banking bosses, politicians and analysts. What they paint is a picture of complacency, greed, recklessness and an attitude of "profit at all costs". As former Barclays chairman Marcus Agius says: "I learned about the traders' activities in one of the regular meetings . . . and I was sick to my stomach." Episodes two and three air on November 17 and 24 at 8.10pm.

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The Last Waltz
Saturday, 6.30pm, Studio

Director Martin Scorsese did rock music lovers a big favour when he filmed Canadian-American group The Band playing its last live performance on November 25, 1976, at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco. It featured a stellar guest list including Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, Ronnie Hawkins, Bob Dylan, Muddy Waters, Ringo Starr, Eric Clapton and Neil Diamond. All seen here in Scorsese's excellent film documentary.

The Fall
Saturday, 7pm, BBC UKTV

Gillian Anderson (The X Files) does a convincing job as Detective Superintendent Stella Gibson, brought over from the London Met to help solve a string of murders in Belfast. Three single, professional women are found dead, their bodies arranged just so on their beds. We know the perp is creepy Paul Spector (Jamie Dornan), a bereavement counsellor married with children, and agonise with Gibson as she follows the clues -- but not in time to prevent another murder. Her own ethics, meanwhile, are not squeaky clean.

Brazil with Michael Palin
Saturday, 7pm, BBC Knowledge

His curiosity, charm and humour make travelling anywhere with Michael Palin an enjoyable voyage of discovery. Despite a passport chockers with stamps after 25 years travelling the globe, he'd never been to Brazil, so last year he and a crew took off to make this four-part series. What he discovers is a country, once thought a basket case, with a booming economy undergoing huge social change. Here, he visits Sao Luis during a festival before heading south to Recife and Salvador. Music, dancing and cowboys galore.

Argo
Sunday, 7pm, M Premiere

Loved this film, directed by and starring Ben Affleck, especially the bit where he strips to the waist for no apparent reason but, oh boy, what a six pack. Made last year, it tells the story of how after Iranian activists storm the US embassy in Tehran on November 4, 1979, six staff escape through a back door to the Canadian embassy. What follows is one of the most extraordinary rescues. An American team, disguised as a film crew, goes to Tehran, supposedly to scout for a location for a sci-fi film. Instead, they get the six fugitives out in a daring manoeuvre that will have you on the edge of your seat, even though you know they make it to safety. But I do wonder what became of the Tehran airport staff who unwittingly let them pass through security and on to the Swissair flight.

To Rome with Love
Monday, 7pm, M Masterpiece

Perhaps not the best film Woody Allen has made but the scenes of Rome make it a visual feast. The ensemble cast isn't to sneeze at either: Alec Baldwin, Penelope Cruz, Judy Davis, Jesse Eisenberg, Greta Gerwig and Ellen Page play visitors to Rome in this romantic comedy. In his first appearance in a screen role since Scoop in 2006, Allen plays Jerry, father of Hayley (Alison Pill), who has fallen in love with a local lawyer -- one of the film's four vignettes.

There's No Such Thing as a Happy Kennedy
Monday, 7pm, Bio

There are few contemporary families who have captured the public's attention like America's Kennedy clan. Money, power, good looks -- they seemed to have it all. On the downside there was so much not to be envied: two assassinations, infidelities, scandals and dark secrets. What was it like growing up in such a family? This month there's a flood of programs prompted by the 50th anniversary of the murder of president John F. Kennedy, but this French production looks at the next generation -- Caroline and John, Robert, Christopher, Mary and David who were so young when JFK died and when his brother Bobby Kennedy, too, was gunned down five years later. Using official footage, intimate film and interviews with people in the know, it reveals a complex family, one who would seem to illustrate the old truism: money can't buy happiness.

Shakespeare, India and Me
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Embarrassing Bodies Down Under
Tuesday, 8pm, LifeStyle You

Do we really need to know this much about other people's physical problems? If you have the stomach for it, tune in to find out what Anne, who has lost 55kg, can do about all that excess skin, plus several other patients' unpleasant ailments. (Common conditions don't make good TV.) To be fair, host Christian and Sam, Ginni and Brad are all doctors who do provide helpful answers to some mortifying problems. And if they haven't targeted your issue you can always apply to be on the show. Just go to the website but not, says the warning, if you are offended by "images and discussions of an explicit medical nature and nudity in a medical context".

Grand Designs Australia
Thursday, 7pm, LifeStyle

Aussie architect Peter Maddison hosts this program, which takes us on a joy ride through builds by owners following a dream. Darren and Ruth Rogers have found a rare vacant block in Melbourne's Richmond. When finished, their house will have views of the city skyline and the MCG. The catch is there's no street frontage; access is via a tiny laneway. Pity the poor neighbours. Plus the Rogers have very different style ideas: he likes luxury and hi-tech, she goes for modest and simple.

Vera
Thursday, 7pm, 13th Street

Vera Stanhope (Brenda Blethyn) is a very different style of police hero. Detective chief inspector with the fictional Northumberland & City Police, she's understated, practical, realistic and witty. Her sharp tongue and, at times, ill temper also set her aside from her long-suffering colleagues. The series, which began in 2011, is based on the works of writer Ann Cleeves; filming has just started on the fourth season. In Hidden Depths, Vera is on the hunt for the murderer of two people whose bodies were surrounded by flowers.

Above Suspicion
Friday, 7pm, 13th Street

Based on Lynda La Plante's novel, this mystery thriller series stars Kelly Reilly as detective constable Anna Travis. In part one, Travis tackles her first homicide: it has been eight years since seven women were murdered and it looks as though the killer is back. She pieces together information that leads her to Alan Daniels (Jason Durr), a much-loved and respected actor, who she finds disconcertingly attractive.