THE amount of repeats on TV is a major bugbear for the majority of viewers.

But occasionally, very occasionally, there is a programme which really merits a second showing.

There was one such last night with A Woman in Love and War: Vera Brittain.

Jo Brand might not seem the natural person to look at the life of a remarkable woman who lost all those who mattered to her during the First World War.

But behind the jokes, lurks a gifted presenter with a real affinity for her subject.

Brand is a huge fan of Vera Brittain’s memoir Testament of Youth and she set out to find out more about the remarkable woman who became a leading pacifist campaigner following her wartime losses.

The documentary highlighted the cost that is borne in wartime by everyone, not just those on the front line.

As anyone with a modicum of interest in the Great War will tell you (never has an offensive been so ironically named) the human cost of war in the trenches was almost incomprehensible.

By concentrating on one person’s story, viewers were able to get a real perspective on the loss and genuine anger that such a brutal time in our history can provoke.

On the back of this, perhaps the Beeb should offer Ms Brand some more serious programmes.