Family Affairs is a British soap opera which first aired on Channel Five in 1997. It initially focused on the Hart family consisting of parents Chris and Annie, adult children Duncan, trainee solicitor Holly, and Melanie (played by Cordelia Bugeja), a police constable. The youngest child was Jamie, a school boy. There were also Annie's parents, Jack and Elsa Gates, and Chris's father Agnus.

Associated characters were Duncan's friend Roy Farmer, Chris's business associate Nick Trip, Annie's friend Maria Simons, Melanie's friend Claire Twomey. Later Maria's ex-husband, the villainous Pete Callan arrived.

Within a brief period of time in late 1998 the Gates were killed-off, and in January 1999 all the Harts (except for Duncan who had already left the series) were killed in a boat explosion. Roy was also aboard and was the only survivor of the blast. Thereafter a more varied bunch of new characters emerged such as Cat and Dave Matthews, Yasmin McHugh, Gemma Craig, Fern Sinclair, Declan Byrne, Gabby Johnson, Sadie Hargreaves, Siobhan Jones, Clive Starr, and later Nikki Warrington and her various family members. Duncan would briefly return to the series, but played by new actor Jonathan Wrather.

During 1999 and the early part of 2000 the departures of Claire, Nick and Maria left Roy as the show's only original character. Claire later returned for a lengthy period spanning 2000 to 2002.

Previously the action took place in a series of suburban homes whose geographic relation to one another was not clearly defined by the series, and the primary meeting place for characters was Pete's slick and modern riverside bar/cafe The Lock. During 2000 Pete sold the Lock and bought an older-style traditional pub The Swan. Incredibly, despite being depised by nearly all the other characters, they followed Pete to become regulars at his new pub and The Lock would not be seen again. In addition to this it soon became apparent that the homes of several of the characters, along with Yasmin's mini-market and Cat's hairdressing salon, were coincidentally located on the same short street where The Swan was located. From this point the series began to more closely resemble established shows like Coronation Street and EastEnders in that the geographic location became the focus; from this point on any established characters in the show not already living on the street would soon move there, and new families would be introduced into the storyline by moving into the street.

The show generally concentrates on family-based storylines and marital upsets. More extreme storylines involving murder, rape, prostitution, blackmail, drug use, and brother-sister incestual relationships have also occurred. It has featured several gay and lesbian characters, and also many troubled younsters having their first brush with the law.