ITV News: Rotas & Presenters

No general daily presenter discussion rule amuses me - being a rota's and presenters thread.

Take that out of the frame, and there is little you are actually allowed to discuss.

I bet the media in China isn't controlled as much as things are on this forum.

I know who came up with this rule

It doesn't encourage proper discussion though, which is what a forum is all about.

If I remember correctly didn't she join ITN to cover Mary Nightingale's maternity leave, and then when Mary returned Nina covered Katie Derham's leave on the lunchtime news? (Then became a relief presenter across all the national bulletins and London Tonight, then replaced Katie on LT?)

I believe that was the case, but the decision to move Nina to London made sense as she was a known presenter to viewers as an ex BBC London/Newsroom South East presenter.

Incidentally, Nina appears to be more off than on ITV News London's 6pm bulletin with the likes of Charlene White and Lucrezia Millarini covering. Millarini ironically seems to get more cover on the main since she left ITV News and went freelance!

That's not surprising - staffers will have contracts stating how many hours they can work, shift patterns and annual leave entitlements. Freelancers can work as much or as little as they want to in the process of covering absences and holidays and don't have annual leave. A friend of mine in the industry worked more shifts in the course of a year as a freelancer than he did as a staffer.

Worth remembering this was also the reason we did not see Katie that often at times on the Evening News, with them opting to use Nina at that time to cover Mary regularly. I do think its a shame though Nina is limited to perhaps one-two Lunchtime bulletins a week in national terms, even though as you say there was logic into the decision to have her in the London role given her regional past. It is of course remembering, that role has give her the chance to cover some interesting stories such as the 2012 Olympics and also the recent Mayor election. Nevertheless, it is a pitty she isn't more prominent nationwide, I was quite disappointed when the reshuffle occurred last year that she did not move into a different role. ITV are lucky in that they have Nina, as well as Mary, Julie, Ranvir and Charlene who are all that their disposal and are versatile, talented newscasters.

Also the likes of Romily Week, Geraint Vincent and Lucy Meacock seem to have been somewhat sidelined for the introduction of Charlene, Ranvir, Rageh, Tom

None of them were ever particularly front lined never mind side lined. Occasional appearances during quite a short lived time in the case of Romilly and Geriant.

I think you could argue Geriant was particularly prominent for a time being, he presented the Evening News every Friday and often in other days with Mark Austin often seemingly away in that period. He also presented many lunchtime bulletins and regularly at weekends. Indeed, he was as prominent/high-ranking as Nina was then and as Charlene, Ranvir and Rageah are now. He did also present News at Ten on a couple of occasions, once alongside Julie in the studio and once on location on what was dubbed the 'Big Freeze'

It doesn't seem a case of being sidelined though perhaps, he is after all Middle East Correspondent which would make it difficult to do news reading duties given his base, I was aware towards the end of his time based in the UK, he was on less but that was likely due to the fact the Lunchtime news became single-headed and Mark and Alistair covered for each other rather than as was the case in the past, Alistair being on London Tonight and unable to, hence the need for another anchor. If he were to be based in the UK again, it would be interesting to see if he would crop up from time to time. He did anchor on location, a Weekend bulletin a couple of years back that he was reporting on also but the details escape me. I always thought he was given a hard time when he presented and was actually a good anchor.

The only national role they could really create for Nina now is to reinstate a permanent Weekend News presenter, or at the very least have her host the Sunday night bulletins alongside either London Tonight or some Lunchtime News editions. However her current role may suit her better.

I wonder too whether with Alastair being dropped from the Evening News returning him to London Tonight has been considered. He'd probably be more of an asset to that than he is the Lunchtime News.

Think Nina is overlooked really, because Charlene white seems to have been chosen over her to become Mary's deputy on the evening news, even Ranvir Singh is in a higher rank on the evening news than Nina, and it has been a while for Ranvir to present the evening news, can't remember last time I saw her doing it, think it was April or earlier. I wonder if Lucrezia Millarini will ever make it to weekday nationals as a relief presenter.