Tenement

An activist is found murdered in her own flat in a tenement, and the list of people who wished her harm is longer than the list of people who liked her. She had campaigned hard, which is another way of saying she had made enemies, and the sharpest of them looks to be the property developer who wanted the building demolished and got her opposition instead. A motive like that is almost too neat. The team know better than to trust neat.

The second thread belongs to Robbie Ross, who is quietly pursuing a hit and run case on his own time. His superiors are not pleased. There is a feeling, familiar to anyone who has watched this job long enough, of an officer doing the right thing in the wrong order and paying for it in paperwork. It sits oddly against the murder enquiry, but the contrast works: one investigation is about bricks and mortar, the other about a single reckless driver, and both matter to somebody. The flats themselves become part of the story: stairwells, landings, doors that open a crack and close again.

Glenn Chandler and Paul Logue wrote it, James Henry directed. Blythe Duff's DS Jackie Reid works the tenement with Alex Norton's DCI Matt Burke and Colin McCredie's DC Stuart Fraser, while John Michie's DI Ross chases his own thread. Cora Bissett is the activist Mhari McCann, Sinéad Keenan is Alice Martin, Ralph Bolland and Stuart McQuarrie are Graham Martin and Jack Lynch, Lorraine McGowan is Charlie McEwan and Antony Strachan is Park Ronnie.

The title promises a building, and the episode delivers the whole street with it. Murder in a tenement means neighbours who heard things, loyalties that run decades deep, and a community that closes ranks when the polis knock. It is a solid, workmanlike episode, the kind that keeps a long-running show honest between the flashier cases. And it earns its ending without cheating.