Mark Austin leaves ITN

Receiving three regions here I've seen a mix of both over the years and on the whole the single headed programmes have been stronger. Most regions still have sports and weather presenters so there are other people for them to interact with.

I guess though in ITV's case where most of the news teams now pre-record another bulletin beforehand there are benefits in having the shows co-hosted.

There have been occasions in the past when Granada Reports has had a single presenter most notably when Anthony Wilson left in 2003. Lucy Meacock presented on her own and sometimes Trevor Green on his own until Tony Morris joined Lucy later that same year.

I prefer Dual Presenters rather than Solo Presenters.

If other ITV regions are anything like West Country, then ITV English Regions probably need the "banter"-potential that being dual-presented brings - just the help fill out their 30 minutes of airtime!

Often most/all of the stories on a typical evening strike me as "human interest fluff", whilst totally missing stories covered by BBC Points West that I would consider to be more "proper news" (or relegating such stories to one-line-each mentions during a quickfire "other news" roundup, as if it's a GMB bulletin).

Such stories as they have ("proper" or otherwise) are often each padded-out to the max - e.g. the main report package, then some generic info/statistics etc about the issues raised by that same story in more general terms, then an interview with someone who has the most tenuous connection with the story (i.e. an "expert" in whatever the relevant field is, but who has no connection to the specific individual(s)/events/location involved).

Then there's all the multi-region "aggregate" feature items, the protracted pre- and post-weather banter... etc etc etc.

With all of that, the actual total number of different stories covered per 6pm programme seems to be significantly fewer than on the corresponding BBC regional programme.

The first two words of the phrase "Regional News Magazine" can struggle to seem like a justifiable description of what is actually being offered up on screen.

We're back to the argument there of funding news gathering versus a second presenter. I do think a huge issue the English regions have on ITV now is basically the news programme has to cover all local content when really the "fluff" would be better suited to a local magazine show in it's own right.

What's the yearly budget for a BBC and ITV regional news operation ? A lead presenter such as Gration/Dinenage/Worman etc probably has a six figure salary, but even that pales compared to all the other costs (doesn't it ?)

I doubt it's quite that myself considering some fairly long term Corrie stars are on around £100k.

Maybe not then, if so, that reinforces my point further

Some regions go in hard with a single presenter, like they are the national news, in other regions this wouldn't work, where there has been a history of two presenters who are like family to long term viewers, and they expect a bit of banter and the like.

There is also the point that one presenter will do lunchtimes and the other will do the late, if there was only one presenter then someone else would have to do the late bulletin. Yes it could be someone on a lower pay scale, but I doubt there is much in it between some of the newer younger co-presenters that many regions now use, and a reporter/presenter.

We have to remember the evening news was single headed up until around 2001. Mary Nightingale will be absolutely fine on her own. Would love to see them align the evening news with News at Ten by refreshing the titles and backdrop.
About the regions there is more charisma to the programme being double headed.

ITV News London is perfectly fine solo. It's probably the best it's been despite cuts since the LNN era. They're able to pad out the lack of VT's with studio guests and still do the usual regional news fluff, such as Christmas lights and plug someone's album or film.

Nina and Charlene are fine with the format, although Lucrezia Millarini comes over as someone more suited to presenting the GMB bulletins, although she lights up as soon as she does a fluffy interview.

Remember isn't ITV London exempt from the shared content reports along with Granada, Wales and Border.

London seems to be quite awkward with just one presenter, however there sometimes a little chemistry alongside Nina/Lucrezia with Martin,
They don't seem to have a proper sports reporter either.

Other regions such as calendar for example have a well known partnership which is Christine & Duncan for that particular region, who have work together for a several years, like central with Bob & Salmeena.