Tourists flock for taste of life on Benefits Street

Whether it has you championing the plight of Fungi or screaming at the television at the lifestyle of White Dee, Becky and Mark, Benefits Street has drawn strong reactions from viewers who celebrate and detest it in equal measure.

With more than five million tuning into to watch the lives of families on James Turner Street, is there an address in Britain that has sparked more debate or discussions over the dinner table?

• Real life on Benefits Street - My week on notorious James Turner Street

During my week on James Turner Street washing cars for a living, I saw the true impact the national spotlight has had on families living on UK's most notorious street.

Tourists have been flocking there at all times of day to take photographs of themselves, and many of them abuse the residents while there – something I experienced first hand.

One by one, car after car pulled up at the junction with Foundry Road and out would hop a person with a camera phone in hand ready to snap the James Turner Street sign.

In one hour I counted 14 cars turn up for a picture.

One of the first was a man in a West Bromwich Albion shirt. His partner was in the driver's seat and his two children sat in the back.

It was 11am and he jumped out the car excitedly as his partner took a picture of him, crouched next to the sign, from their people carrier. 'Did you get it?' he asked before running back to the car.

And off they went.

Next up was a young a mother and her two children, still dressed in their pyjamas.

She organised them like a teacher would pupils in a class photo, took a photograph and continued on her way.

They were followed by a smartly dressed couple in their 40s who convinced each other to get the picture before gleefully walking off arm in arm.

Then arrived two men in their 30s, wearing hoodies and chinos, who gave the thumbs up for the snap.

Families living on James Turner barely batted an eyelid – but even they became part of the spectacle.

A father came out of his home with his son and walked to the nearby park.

His innocent stroll with his child was recorded on a camera phone by a girl who pointed it at him from her car as he headed down the street.

He was blissfully unaware he was being filmed like an animal would be at a zoo.

The voyeur then laughed and passed the phone to a friend in the backseat to see the footage.

It was uncomfortable to witness.

The next tourist stunned me – a paramedic in a rapid response vehicle aiming a camera at the sign from their window.

Council workers, pupils on school trips, plumbers, all got out of their vehicles to get a picture. I asked one man 'why?' and his response was 'well you gotta ay ya?'

The irony of it all was that the people who were visiting James Turner Street were acting worse than the residents they had apparently come to mock.

In the shop on the corner of nearby Perrott Street one shopper claimed clubbers on a night out in Birmingham were requesting taxi drivers to take them down to James Turner Street on their way home.

"At 4am these girls were screaming out the window of a taxi that they were in James Turner Street," she complained.

Later that day I saw it for myself. Two young women got out of a taxi near to the street sign and asked their driver to take the photo.

Then they got back in to carry on their journey.

I'd only been on James Turner for a couple of days, but I felt a genuine feeling of anger towards the 'tourists' as they held up traffic, kerb crawled outside people's home and shouted out their windows at residents.

I was to be on the receiving end of this.

As one of the many boy racer cars rolled up near to the sign a Ford Fiesta, with blacked out windows, came to a stop.

Down came the passenger side window and a blonde hair lad yelled 'f*****g scrounger' just at the car wheel-spinned away.

It didn't matter that I had never appeared on the show or had encouraged any sort of confrontation. To that lad I was guilty by association with the street and to him, anyone with a hoody, tracksuit bottoms and trainers was to be ridiculed and abused.

I only got a snapshot of what life is life at the moment on James Turner Street, but many families appeared to be prisoners in their own homes.

Although some of the 'stars' have been allegedly cashing in on their new found fame – and I did see White Dee posing for a couple of pictures – many people can't wait for this series to end, and for James Turner Street to become a distant memory in viewers' minds.