DATE: 1993; ITN news at seven on itv?

As some may will be aware I have been digging up the achieve of old newspapers for tv listings, I have been looking at some headlines, included complaint about Voting system even at the 1979 election.

I got the wrong papers out this I was unable to look at Night time listings: bang goes solving one problem:

I come across this From the Independent Newspaper Thursday 7th Sept 1993:

5.40: News:
If or rather when itv turns News at ten into News at Seven, thus John Suchet and his team get the boot. If Ch4 has any scene it would cut its main news in half and move it to 10 O'clock.

I looked in the paper I could not find anything about this, I did notice headline saying
"ITN angry vow has come back up"

What was the deal behide all this?

I have a vague recollection of ITV considering a primetime news service, which would have meant the demise of the early evening bulletin and also News at Ten. It was also the time when a permanent move to 8pm was being considered for Coronation Street.

However, didn't it transpire a few years later that ITV did actually implement this, albeit the bulletin became the 6:30 news with Trevor, and News at Ten was ditched for the Late Night News with Mark Austin, IIRC?

The original plan for a primetime 7pm bulletin would have meant that most viewers would have already have taken their digest with the BBC Six, and also the new 7pm bulletin would have gone head to head with another ITN production, namely Channel Four News.

Anyway, clearly it didn't happen, except for the configuration mentioned in my second paragraph.

It was Dermot Murnaghan.

I'm pretty sure A Licence to Be Different talks about this because IIRC ITN wanted Channel 4 to move their news. I'll have to look it up when I'm back in Leeds next week.

I've vague (secondary) recollections of ITN moving the news to 8pm also being an option. Didn't they air at 8pm during the first Gulf War?

Yes but it was only for 5min.

I've got the 'And Finally' book about ITN published in 2005, I don't recall reading anything about a 7pm bulletin, but it was as early as about 1994 that Carlton got the ball rolling for the axe of News At Ten, as they believed that in the long term ITV would be better off for having the 10-11pm slot free for new programmes and getting 'a younger audience' obviously this never happened and the NaT was probably the worst commercial mistake ITV made in recent years.

Thread creep.................is that book still available to buy from ITN or any source?

8pm news: yes, I now also vaguely recall this being mooted for a while as well. But, I guess the current timings (6pm regions / 6:30pm network) are probably as optimum as one could expect, unless they went completely head to head with BBC News.

eBay probably the best place for the And Finally... book.