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In the West Midlands, Birmingham was the main headline, with the hit-and-run deaths of Haroon Jahan, Shazad Hussain and Musaver Ali. But trouble also happened in West Bromwich, and Wolverhampton, where about 300 youths ran riot through the afternoon and evening of Tuesday.

They told me what they had done to defend the temple, after stones had been thrown at it: in the early hours of Wednesday, as many as 30 men had stood sentry outside, before groups of five or six worked in shifts. The rioters they had seen, they told me, had been "mixed, but mostly black".

Contrary to stereotypes, they were almost feral: well-turned out, polite and pretty, she has even the odd phrase that reveals traces of social conservatism. When I asked the parents, a voice shot back said: ". If you 't beat your kids, they' ll be naughty"

In addition to a gambling hall, the other business, the heavy damage caused West Ham 's branch of the big-box chain Staples. "When Staples was getting destroyed," said a 16-year-old who called himself Critz, "the police were just there Four riot vans, 20 or 30 police .. It was like they wanted us to do Staples \."

Why do people have to do it?

"Free shit" said a voice. "And damn the system."

"You smash up the shops," said a boy who would only identify himself as Corey, "and you get free stuff. Everything's about money these days, innit?"

"If it 're stopping EMA [Education Maintenance Allowance] \," added another, "what they will do to us?", I asked myself whether this one line stuck cynically by some talking head on the was TV and parroted back to me, but all said six, she wanted to go to college - a music course has already been mentioned, with repeated shots of GCSEs - but in the absence of EMA, they were now asking whether it was worth it.