TV review: The Pet Detectives

Oh, I see. I was hoping that The Pet Detectives (Channel 4) was going to be about animals who solve crimes – Hercule Parrot, Inspector Mouse, you can almost certainly come up with better ones. But The Pet Detectives are actually retired policemen who try to solve crimes against animals. Kidnap mostly, occasionally murder.

We start off at a press conference in Cornwall. John Haywood, Britain's number one investigator of exotic pet theft, is appealing for any information about a cruel and callous crime. Twenty one budgerigars have gone missing, three were left dead. The timing – the night before the Cornwall Budgerigar Show – may not be a coincidence. Now the owner needs closure; we all need closure. "It's like kidnapping a baby," says John, who, like Morse, drives a Jaguar.

Apparently there's now more money in stealing pets than there is in flat-screen TVs. Those idiot looters were wasting their time in Currys and The Carphone Warehouse. Pets at Home, that's where the real money was.

Fortunately John is not the only one fighting this epidemic. Colin Butcher, ex-CID, is on the case of a missing black labrador. And Tom Watkins runs Animal Search UK, the most professional-looking of these organisations. They have police-style cars with high–vis paint jobs, they wear bright orange jackets and carry walkie-talkies. At the moment they're looking for two cats – a ginger called Jack and a black tom called Sweep.

"It's all about the Big Society, as David Cameron says," explains Tom. "That's what we're doing – the big society of pet owners." Except that a two-person team from Animal Search UK will cost you £1,000 a day. Well, they have got orange jackets and walkie- talkies, but I'm not sure that's how the Big Society is supposed to work, is it?

Sweep's owner's budget soon runs out, so sadly he falls out of the bottom of the Big Pet Society and Tom and his team concentrate on ginger Jack, whose owner Julia is a finance executive and seems to have unlimited resources. They make a recording of Julia, they get some posters made, they speak into their walkie-talkies wearing bright orange jackets. They find a ginger cat who isn't Jack and trap another cat who isn't even ginger. Jack is returned, two months after going missing, as a direct result of the Animal Search UK poster campaign, we're told. I suppose Julia could have done her own posters, and saved herself £1,000 a day. I wonder what her final bill was. Still, Jack's back and that's what matters.

It's not going brilliantly elsewhere. Colin manages to snatch back the black labrador but the case ends in the high court, where the judge orders the dog returned to the woman it was snatched from, not Colin's client. He gets a new case – Biscuit, a stolen springer spaniel – but fails to find him, not even a crumb. And in the budgie case, after four months of dead ends and rumours that come to nothing, John Haywood calls it a day. There'll be no closure in Cornwall.

Finally Tom Watkins and Animal Search UK get to show what they can do. Spencer, a Shetland sheepdog, has bolted from his owners at a service station. Tom scrambles three vehicles, an army of people in high-vis jackets. Plus a German shepherd and his handler who together, we're told, are "writing a new chapter in the book of pet detection". (I wonder how many times it took narrator Paul Thornley to say that without giggling). Tom devises a military strategy. They scour the countryside, talking into their walkie-talkies. We're talking Raoul Moat, in terms of search scale.

Eventually they track Spencer down. He's sitting in a field, tired and confused. Tom goes in – he's going to sneak up on Spencer, unnoticed, in his bright orange high-vis jacket! Er, there you are, Tom. Spencer trots off. Tom gives chase, and falls over a gate. I'm not sure there's meant to be, but there's a lot of comedy in this show.

Spencer is eventually caught. After a week! Jesus, if Tom charges a grand a day for a two-person team to look for a cat, what's all this costing? Let's hope Spencer's owner is a Qatari prince.

The money's not the point though. A dog is reunited with his owners. And a few brave men are taking on this evil crime wave sweeping the country. Either that or a bunch of clowns are putting orange jackets on in order to make money out of other people's distress. You decide. It's surprisingly entertaining, though, as television.