If you want to never enjoy yourself again, watch the Government's video about summer holiday terrorism

It has been suggested that the film could be played on aeroplanes as a jolly added extra to the pre-flight safety demonstration. That at least might have the effect of distracting passengers who are afraid of flying – why worry about the brace position when you have a horde of terrorists waiting for you in arrivals?

This summer will be the third in a row I haven't ventured abroad, the prospect of taking a baby/toddler on a plane or ferry being frankly unappetising. And in light of a new film advising tourists how to stay safe in the event of a terror attack, I’m tempted never to travel overseas again.

Catchily titled “Run, hide, tell: Responding to a firearms or weapons attack”, the four-minute video has been released by counter-terrorism police in association with the Foreign Office and Abta, the travel association. Holidaymakers have been encouraged to watch it before they travel, although the authorities are keen to emphasise that there is no specific intelligence that British tourists are at immediate risk of being targeted.

It has been suggested that the film could be played on aeroplanes as a jolly added extra to the pre-flight safety demonstration. That at least might have the effect of distracting passengers who are afraid of flying – why worry about the brace position when you have a horde of terrorists waiting for you in arrivals?

The film opens jauntily enough: children milling round a nicely-appointed hotel; adults chilling in the sunshine with a range of brightly coloured drinks; shades, straw hats and skimpy shorts are the order of the day, as the voiceover man reassures us that “firearms attacks are thankfully rare”.

Then the music starts to get a little bit menacing, gunshots ring out and suddenly that thankfully rare event is becoming a reality. Those who can find an escape route run for their lives, very purposefully leaving their belongings (but not stopping to think whether it might be easier to sprint without flip-flops).

Others barricade themselves behind a door with a fairly flimsy-looking bedframe, while the poor old hotel manager ends up alone in the laundry room. Eventually – and, please note, only when safe to do so – one particularly sensible-looking holidaymaker calls the cops, who arrive en masse, heavily armed, stepping around dead bodies as they hunt the attackers.

It’s not the experience promised in the brochure.

The “run, hide, tell” advice isn’t new. It is the message which counter-terrorism agencies have been pushing ever since the back end of 2015, after the Isis-inspired attacks in Paris brought a new type of mass, indiscriminate terror to Western Europe.

Previous public information films focused on how to respond to a similar incident, were one to take place in the UK. Sure enough, when news began to break of the recent attack in Borough Market, police used social media channels to urge people in the vicinity to get out of the area as quickly as possible – or to hide if they could not escape.

With the summer holiday season approaching, it is hard to fault the logic of producing a film aimed squarely at the tourist market. The nightmare scenario for officials and for tour operators is a repeat of the 2015 assault on the Hotel Rui Imperial Marhaba in Tunisia, which left 38 dead at the hands of a Kalashnikov-wielding killer. If a sub-Spooks style infomercial helps people to act calmly and sensibly when confronted by the unthinkable, then who are we to argue?

After all, this is the reality of our lives now – and has been ever since the London bombings in 2005 shattered the illusion that the UK might not be a target for determined Islamist terrorists. We try not to let past events affect our daily routines, but who hasn’t had that moment of doubt before stepping into a tube carriage or attending a concert or even hanging out at a busy city centre bar?

Tough though it may be to accept, that sense of being vaguely on our guard cannot be dropped just because we happen to be on vacation. What happened in Tunisia – and in Bali in 2002 – shows plainly that being a tourist can, in fact, create a danger of its own, as terrorists take advantage of vulnerable targets and easier access to firearms than might be the case in this country.

Thirty years ago children were told by Charley the cat not to go off with a chap in the park who’d offered to show you sweets and puppies. Now we’re running away from men with AK-47s. What a world we live in, eh?