Taking family power struggles and turning them into global television sensations is becoming something of a habit for screenwriter Steven Knight.

With Peaky Blinders, he took a Birmingham street gang and made them a cultural force. Now, Knight is betting on another dynasty, one rooted in brewing, wealth and legacy.

House of Guinness, which launches on Netflix on Thursday, tells the story of Ireland’s most famous family name at the moment of crisis – Sir Benjamin Guinness has died and his four children, each concealing dark secrets, are left to steer the brewery’s fate.

Knight says when he looked into the real-life Guinness family, “it was immediate that I realised this is an incredible drama and story”.

He was struck by “the characters, events and how it all intermeshed with history and what was going on at the time”.

While the story is based on real events, it is a drama first and foremost. Fact and fiction have been blended together, but Knight says he doesn’t see those two things as mutually exclusive, as “it’s often the true events that are the least believable”.

“Some of the historical events are so amazing and unexpected you wouldn’t make them up yourself,” he tells the BBC.

One of the imagined figures in the Netflix drama is Sean Rafferty, the brewery’s foreman, played by Happy Valley star James Norton, whose fate becomes entangled with the dynasty’s power struggles.

Norton says his character is an “amalgamation of lots of different people” who existed at the time, adding that he found researching into the history of Guinness “remarkable and fascinating”.

The 40-year-old explains that as soon as he read the script he was ready to sign up to the show.

“I read the first four scripts all at once and it was a no-brainer,” he says. “Almost every scene starts with Rafferty’s silhouette in a window in a cloud of smoke and I thought ‘sign me up, that’s really cool’.”

Most of the actors in the series were Irish, something Norton says added a level of pressure when it came to perfecting the accent and admits he was “so scared on the first day”.

“You work really hard at the beginning and once you crack the first big dialogue scene and have spoken the first lines there’s no going back,” he explains.

The first scene Norton filmed was one where he punches three disloyal workers at the Guinness factory. He says he used the line ‘I see your three names written in black ash up there’ to get back into the accent for subsequent scenes.

Starring alongside Norton is Irish actress Danielle Galligan who plays Lady Olivia, an aristocrat who marries into the Guinness family. After the British monarch, she was the richest woman in Britain and Ireland at the time.

The actress says she loved researching her character and understanding what she was really like.

“She’s such a firecracker in the series and then I actually found out she was also a very solitary and silent woman who painted lots of watercolours,” Galligan explains.

“She was a woman who had everything and yet was still looking for something. Learning about her gave me a sense of her lack of fulfilment and added another layer to her.”

Galligan says it was very special to tell an Irish story and “to do it on a global scale is a once-in-a-lifetime kind of experience”.

Joining Galligan is Niamh McCormack, whose character is part of the rebellious Fenian Brotherhood, and Jack Gleeson, who is best known for playing Joffrey Baratheon in Game of Thrones.

McCormack and Gleeson say they are proud to be part of a series that puts Ireland on the map, but admit that with pride comes pressure over how it will be received by audiences at home.

“It’s always a factor but I tried not to think about it too much,” Gleeson says. “You want things to be represented well but also hopefully people know not to take it too seriously as a historical document.”

Knight was less worried about what audiences would think, admitting: “I should care but I don’t – if you worry what people are going to think you can’t really do anything as you’d be trying to please too many different people.”

House of Guinness has already been compared to the likes of Succession, The Crown and Peaky Blinders but Knight is indifferent about how people compare it.

“People say every project is a cross between stuff and I don’t take that too seriously, I’m confident that this is its own thing,” he says.

For Norton, who is also currently starring in BBC’s historical drama King & Conqueror, to be compared to such successful shows is a positive.

“To be in the same breath as those dynasty shows is great and I’m happy if we’re included among that group,” he says. Gleeson agrees and explains that this drama “takes the best bits of the rest and adds its own magic and essence”.

Knight does admit that there are many similarities between House of Guinness and Peaky Blinders and the shows have influenced each other as the 66-year-old has recently finished working on the Peaky Blinder film, The Immortal Man, which will see Cillian Murphy reprise his role as Birmingham gangster Tommy Shelby.

“Sometimes parallels are pointed out that I don’t even have a clue about,” he laughs. “But there are a lot of similarities – the family, it has the same energy, humour and swagger.”

Knight is also involved in writing the new James Bond film, which he previously told the BBC had always been on his bucket list.

The movie will be directed by Dune’s Denis Villeneuve and is currently in development and being overseen by Amazon MGM Studios after long-serving masterminds Barbara Broccoli and Michael G Wilson stood down in February.

When asked a question about Bond, Knight smiles and says he’s not able to talk about it but does admit that after the success of several of his shows, he feels a greater freedom to write more creatively.

And with House of Guinness, he hopes to have used that freedom to make this latest dynasty saga a success in its own right.

Campaigners have said stronger deterrents are needed to stop water pollution after figures obtained by BBC News NI showed there were 63 fines handed down between 2020 and 2024.

In the same period there were 4,202 water pollution incidents confirmed by the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA).

The Department for Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (Daera) is consulting on whether fixed penalty notices should be introduced, which would mean polluters could be fined without the lengthy process of prosecuting them through the courts.

Friends of the Earth said unless there was a more effective deterrent there would be “more and more of these shocking crimes against water”.

In recent years large blooms of potentially toxic blue-green algae in Lough Neagh – caused in large part by long-term pollution – have grabbed the headlines.

But incidents of pollution happen right across Northern Ireland’s waterways, not just those which eventually lead to the lough.

Daera said it and the NIEA took the issue very seriously and that the NIEA investigated all reports it received and pursued offenders.

James Orr from Friends of the Earth said the figures revealed “an epidemic in relation to how we’re treating our rivers, lakes and sea loughs”.

He said fixed penalty notices – which are already used for things such as dog fouling or illegal parking – had pros and cons.

“We can’t have these cases dragged through the courts for years and years and then a pathetic fine introduced at the end.

“On the one hand we would be quite encouraged that we could simplify these processes.

“On the other hand, we need the penalty to reflect the seriousness of the crime.

“This is not like parking on a double yellow line, this is much more serious.”

Under the current rules, the maximum fine that can be handed down is £20,000.

Mr Orr called for this limit to be scrapped and said there should be an independent Environmental Protection Agency.

The Daera consultation on whether to introduce fixed penalty notices is also asking people whether or not the maximum fines should be increased to £50,000 in magistrates’ courts and whether the limit should be removed entirely in Crown courts.

All 63 fines ranged from £200 to £10,000.

Of these, six were more than £5,000.

In a statement, Daera said formal enforcement action was normally considered for water pollution incidents which it deemed to have a “high” or “medium” severity.

Lower severity incidents normally did not lead to formal enforcement action and would see NIEA work with the polluter to identify the cause and stop it happening again.

From 2020 to 2024, 96 incidents were deemed to be high severity and 542 medium, with the rest categorised as low.

People who use the waterways have said they are frustrated that incidents of pollution keep happening.

In June, anglers on the Moyola River raised the alarm after the river was turned brown due to what they believe was discharge from industry.

Maurice Dorrity, who has been fishing on the river for decades, said the situation was getting worse.

“I had a meeting on the bank of the river 30 years ago [to discuss] the same problem and it’s not got any better, it’s still the same,” he said.

“It has a devastating effect on the fish life.

“On the bed of the river the fish depends on the invertebrates, small insects to sustain their life, just like we need the ground to grow our crops.

“It clogs up all that invertebrate life on the bed of the river and it means the fish are not getting the food they require.”

Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) councillor Denies Johnston reported the incident to the NIEA.

She said many of the problems were stemming from some “irresponsible” farmers and industries.

“There must be a two-prong response, we must incentivise good practice and punish infringements,” she said.

“Until we clamp down on those who are disregarding the advice, ignoring regulations and putting their own selfish interests ahead of our environment, our waters will continue to run orange (as was the case in the Moyola in July) and green (as in Lough Neagh).”

A Daera spokesperson said in addition to fines, other methods including warning letters and notices were available to it.

They added that strengthening environmental governance was a top priority for Daera Minister Andrew Muir.

Incidents do not have to be large in scale to cause damage.

Earlier in September, an incident south of Dungannon led to sewage spewing into the River Rhone.

The NIEA said it was caused by wipes and rags being disposed of incorrectly.

Democratic Unionist Party councillor Clement Cuthbertson said it was a reminder that it was not just agriculture to blame for pollution.

“The landowner had livestock in the field and they had to be moved back to allow a clean up to take place,” he said.

“There needs to be investment on the network.

“Our towns and our villages are expanding all the time, but to be fair to NI Water they are still working on the original pipeworks that could be 40 or 50 years old.”

Scotland’s most experienced university principal has called for a review of the funding and shape of higher education, warning against “stumbling from year to year”.

Sir Anton Muscatelli, who retires this month after 16 years as the principal and vice-chancellor of Glasgow University, says universities need a plan which could see major changes in the courses they teach and the research they carry out.

He told the BBC that charging tuition fees to Scottish students is unlikely to secure support at Holyrood so Scotland needs to work out what it wants from higher education and then decide how to pay for it.

His call comes ahead of two crucial reports, due to be published on Friday by the Scottish Funding Council (SFC), about the financial position of universities and of further education colleges.

Both studies have been delayed since early this year – and should reflect the latest financial figures up to June.

This comes as analysis seen by the BBC suggests Scottish government finance for universities and further education colleges has been squeezed in real terms in the past six years by about a fifth.

FE colleges say they are having to turn away qualified applicants and that apprenticeship course are over-subscribed, while universities are limiting the number of places they can offer Scottish students.

In recent years, some have subsidised the cost of educating Scottish students by sharply increasing their recruitment of foreign students but those numbers have started to decline.

Earlier this year, Dundee University was hit by a severe financial crisis.

A report into the near-collapse of the university said it had continued with increased spending despite a drop in foreign student fee income.

Its principal went before a Scottish Parliament committee and admitted incompetence and senior board members resigned over the mismanagement.

Dundee has so far required a Scottish government bailout of more than £40m.

It is an extreme example but other Scottish universities are also under financial strain.

Edinburgh University is planning cuts of £140m, including job losses.

Its principal, Sir Peter Matheson, has called for a “radical re-wiring” to respond to the funding challenge.

Both institutions and others have seen recent strikes by academic staff to highlight the effect of cuts.

Students at Scottish universities with permanent homes in Scotland don’t pay tuition fees.

Instead, the universities get money from the government for a set number of Scottish students each year.

However, they claim that the amount they receive does not cover their costs – and in most cases is not as much as the £9,500 a year that students from the rest of the UK usually pay.

Foreign students in Scotland pay much higher fees – in many cases nearly three times more than UK students.

Most of them come to the UK to do post-graduate Masters degree courses.

This has been an area that has provided a welcome source of funding in recent years but it has fallen away sharply for several reasons, including new UK immigration rules and competition from other countries.

There is no sign of Holyrood ministers or their opponents moving to end ‘free tuition’ for Scottish students, so they need to find other ways of tackling their financial problems.

The BBC has had access to a new study carried out by David Bell, a professor of economics at Stirling University and expert in public finance.

The study, written for the Royal Society of Edinburgh, details how funding per Scottish university student has fallen over the past five years due to the effect of inflation.

In real terms, the funding shrunk by 22% between 2019-20 and 2023-24, Prof Bell says.

The academic also used publicly available data to show that the fees universities receive fall far short of what they estimate are the costs of educating students.

For instance, in modern languages, the £7,421 annual funding per student is half of what they say is required.

In dentistry, the Scottish government last year paid £19,580 per student.

This is reckoned to be at least £9,000 short of the cost to universities.

The funding for veterinary studies, law, social work, media studies, drama, architecture, planning, anatomy, chemistry, mineral engineering, philosophy and religion would have to be increased by at least 70% to reach the actual cost of educating the average student, Prof Bell says.

Universities also say their research funding, from governments and other sources, fails to cover costs of the overheads they have in facilities.

The number of foreign students at Scottish universities has nearly doubled since 2006-07, when it was 24,200.

The figure reached a peak of 47,700 in 2022-23 before falling back.

Prof Bell’s report details the ways in which the money from overseas students is threatened by changes to immigration requirements.

There are new rules that bar students from bringing their families, as well as a reduction in the time foreign nationals are allowed to work in the UK after graduating.

Some universities are much more exposed than others to volatile foreign student income.

The University of the West of Scotland and Glasgow Caledonian have three quarters of the places on their taught post-grad courses filled by non-UK students.

Older universities such as Glasgow and Edinburgh have many more such students, and more than half of whom are from overseas.

The number of places for Scottish students doing their first degree is capped in each university, due to constraints in Scottish government funding.

But there is no limit to the number of places that can be taken by students from the rest of the UK.

They pay the same level of annual tuition fees that they would pay in the rest of the UK.

For the new academic year, that is £9,535, a rise of of 3.1%.

Universities across the UK say this amount has not increased by very much for more than a decade and claim that it also falls short of the actual cost of educating students.

Universities such as Edinburgh and St Andrews have almost as many students from England, Wales and Northern Ireland as they do from Scotland, with roughly a third from each.

Glasgow, by contrast, is 66% Scottish and 15% are from the rest of the UK.

For newer universities, with less of a reputation and prestige, income from the rest of the UK students is more limited.

At Glasgow Caledonian and the University of the Highlands and Islands, the Scottish share is more than 95%.

One effect of the Scottish government providing tuition fees for students from Scotland is that graduates themselves leave university with much less debt.

The study cites research that indicates the average Scot graduated in 2023 with debt of £15,430, while the figure for the rest of the UK was £44,940.

Prof Bell’s research gives extensive detail on earnings five years after they graduate.

His figures, based on the 2021-22 tax year, vary widely.

They show a computing graduate from St Andrews was earning an average £77,000, three times as much as one from the University of the West of Scotland.

The lowest pay was for a typical graduate in art and design from the University of the Highlands and Islands, on £15,300.

Other high-earning graduates were in medicine, dentistry and economics.

Among lower earners were those with degrees in media, sociology and performing arts.

The report says that the annual earnings of those with qualifications in health-related and STEM subjects tend to exceed the Scottish average, while those with arts qualifications tend to earn less.

Prof Bell points out that funding is mainly allocated to universities based on the previous year’s funds.

He argues that this gives little scope for innovation and change.

Sir Anton Muscatelli also talks about the case for universities becoming more different from each other.

The Glasgow University principal says there will be a need for more of them to share resources and show they are operating efficiently, with mergers being an option.

Looking to next year’s Holyrood election, he says politicians need to acknowledge that the education sector is going to be crucial to the success of the Scottish economy.

He said: “It really is imperative that we don’t stumble from year to year [but] think about how this is going to be shaped or resourced.

“We need a strategic plan as a country, which is why I suspect after 2026, there will need to be a look at the shape and size of the Scottish [university] sector.

“I hope this is done in a rational way. I strongly believe in a publicly-funded sector, I hope that can be achieved, but let’s start with the question: what sector does Scotland need?”