Channel 4 under fire over footage of homeless girl shooting up

Channel 4 has been accused of exploitation and irresponsibility over scenes showing a 16-year-old homeless girl taking heroin to be broadcast tomorrow in a hard-hitting TV documentary on Britain's street children. Filmed crouching in the filthy stairwell of an underground Edinburgh car park, the Dispatches programme shows 16-year-old Robyn injecting the drug into the back of her hand and losing consciousness. "Filming this is exploitative and irresponsible," said Mike Linnell, spokesman for the drug charity Lifeline. Linnell, who has worked with homeless and hard-to-reach drug addicts for 25 years, said he knew of many cases where drug addicts had been traumatised by appearing on similar programmes. "A young girl like Robyn can't give informed consent," he said. "She won't understand that the image of her shooting up will be broadcast around the world and last forever. I know addicts who have been traumatised and humiliated by footage like this following them for many years. Even if they successfully fight their addiction, their children could see the footage years later." Robyn, who has been living on the streets since she was 12 years old, is shown unpacking her syringe and drugs and flicking the top of a full syringe. "The first time I took heroin, I think I was 11," she said. "I'm just doing this to put the air bubbles out of it. If an air bubble goes into your brain, that's you gone. Now what I need to do is pull my sleeve up." The camera stays on her, filming from three different angles as she empties the syringe into the back of her hand and appears to leave it dangling there, as she quickly slips into unconciousness. Brian Woods, executive producer of the True Vision documentary, which was made in consultation with two homeless charities, has said it would have "distorted" Robyn's story not to show her injecting the drug. "This is what Robyn does every day, several times a day," he said. "We needed to show it to communicate the sordid, horrible reality of her life. To try to dodge that would be misleading." Every day, hundreds of British children are forced to leave homes characterised by family breakdown, addiction, neglect and abuse. The true figure, however, is unknown: the last reliable number was from the Children's Society over five years ago, when it was estimated that over 100,000 teenagers under 16 run away every year. Teenagers can turn to a wide range of state and voluntary agencies for councilling and support. But these young people – frightened, naive and with their trust in adults eroded – frequently reject those who try to help, becoming part of the hidden homeless: a lost generation resisting any contact with officials or authorities. Charities including Shelter and Railway Children say the number of homeless children will rise as a result of the comprehensive spending review, putting increasing pressure on services. The documentary makers spent six months following half a dozen teenagers who are forced to fend for themselves. Robyn, who has seven different support workers trying to help her, was just one. "I would describe my childhood as extreme," she said as she took the camera crew around the syringe-strewn graveyard in the centre of Edinburgh where she slept when she was just 13. "When it was bad it was horrifying. I used to go to bed with a knife under my pillow. The funny thing is that loads of things happened on that bed and I was lying there with that knife lying right beside me," she said. Robyn was taken into care when she was 12 but ran away a couple of days later, as do 30% of children bought up in social care. "I had 30 to 40 police charges against me in two weeks," she admitted. "I was made up of violence and anger and drugs. That's what I was taught and that's what I still believe in. "I've met people [on the street] who are animals," she added. "Rapists, paedophiles and the mentally ill, who are ill to the stage when they would chop you up because they were in a bad mood. I would say there's two groups of people on the street: you've got the predators and you've got the prey." By law, homeless teenagers aged 16 to 18 are the responsibility of local councils. The Labour government made it a priority for local councils to reduce the number of young people sleeping rough. But with budgets being slashed, it is becoming increasingly hard to house teenagers in long-term hostels, where care and support is available. Instead, with fewer places available, thousands of children are placed in bed and breakfast lodgings to keep them off the streets. Many children who run away don't realise the risks: research shows that one in 12 under-16s are sexually assaulted on the streets. Many more are victims of physical attacks. "You just get used to a [bad] quality of life [on the streets]," said Robyn. "At 13, I had come out of an environment where bad stuff was happening all the time and [the streets] didn't seem that bad. I was so traumatised I was desensitised to everything. There was nothing that could shock me because I expected to die anyway." Channel 4 said last night: "Robyn wanted to take part in the film to tell her story and show the reality of her life in all its detail. The production team are very experienced in working with young people and with drug addicts – they discussed the film with her and her youth worker and ensured Robyn was fully informed and happy to proceed before any filming took place. They spent over five months with Robyn and are still in regular contact with all the contributors and offer them their support." • Dispatches: Britain's Street Kids will be broadcast on 1 November, 8pm on Channel 4