Election 2015 - BBC Regions News changes - 15 min post NAT

Would it not make more since to have three sperate debates for the nations? At the same time?

So the 1 o'clock news is now effectively 40 minutes long? I suspect they'll ditch the opt at 1:15 and we might get a 'coming up' sequence at 10:15?

Not a big fan of this move to be honest - it's a shame they're cutting the lunchtime bulletin so now both the Beeb and ITV have very little daytime regional news, and 10:30 I'm not convinced there is an appetite for such long bulletins, particularly when it will push back the likes of Question Time and Graham Norton. Could they have just trimmed 5 mins off lunch and added that to the late, effectively giving us two 10 minute bulletins?

Not if they want the leaders of the parties to be on them all

Leaders of Scottish Labour, Welsh Conservatives... Then you still have your Prime Ministerial debate for the whole of the UK.

But in terms of leadership the leaders of Scottish Labour and Welsh Conservatives are unlikely to be PM. You have to be able to see a potential PM from the main Labour or Conservative party debate whether you live in England, Scotland, Northern Ireland or Wales.

Of course you can run additional debates for the nations, but you can't replace the national debate.

That's the dichotomy of our style of democracy. You vote for a local representative, but you also vote for who you want to lead the country, at the same time.

I think it might make more sense to run additional debates on the economy, health, employment etc. with spokespeople from the parties involved - possibly on the 24 hour news channels. That would at least give you an idea what you might actually be voting for.

Which makes it even more stupid. Will be interesting actually to see if the ratings for the later bulletins and the programmes that follow them are affected - 20 minutes seems a long slog for regional news at that time of night. The advantage of the shorter bulletins IMO is you get the regional news without the filler fluff!

Isn't that exactly what I said? Run debates in the nations and then keep the Prime Ministerial C4/Sky debate? By your argument, nobody other than Cameron and Miliband should be in any debates.

If it were me, I'd be saying we should have two five-party debates to be broadcast across England and the nations doing their own thing with Plaid/SNP etc. in place of the virtually non-existent in terms of support UKIP.

I think there is a place for SNP, Plaid and the Northern Irish parties (Sinn Fein only if they actually turn up) to be seen nationally - as they could hold a major role in a coalition government in Westminster. MPs are MPs... (At least until the "not all MPs are equal" legislation happens...)

South East Today have done one too, nothing specific about it being for the election campaigns, just the usual 'more in depth' 'more analysis' 'even more detailed weather'.

All seems a bit unnecessary to me, the length of the late bulletin seemed just right. Remember the days when BBC One's late lineup began at 9.30 and not 10.45pm!

Looks like the extra 10 minutes of the one o'clock news will be England-only with the nations opting out at half past.

What could possibly go wrong?

That makes sense. It will allow them to deal with England-only issues. I wonder will the English regional opt-outs from the headlines go too.

What's happening in the Channel Islands? There is currently no CI news until
6:30 where they get 15 minutes, but they get the full length at 10:30. As they aren't in the UK there are no elections to report. Will they reuse more stories from 6:30 to fill the time or will they opt back to Plymouth?