88 Paul McKinney (Down from 85)
HEAD OF NEWS AND CURRENT AFFAIRS, SCOTTISH TELEVISION
Last year we noted how McKinney had given Scotland Today a sharper look. But he may change the face of Scottish TV news altogether with a homegrown version of ITV’s news at 10.30pm, with Trevor McDonald making way for Sarah Heaney.
The proposed programme would have exactly the same look and feel as the existing UK bulletin
Does that mean that ITN would have to build another million pound theatre of news for this new programme? I suppose they could use the ITV News Channel second set for it.
The proposed programme would have exactly the same look and feel as the existing UK bulletin
Does that mean that ITN would have to build another million pound theatre of news for this new programme? I suppose they could use the ITV News Channel second set for it.
my guess is that they use the second studio that looks like the real thing, but is also totally fake!
The proposed programme would have exactly the same look and feel as the existing UK bulletin
Does that mean that ITN would have to build another million pound theatre of news for this new programme? I suppose they could use the ITV News Channel second set for it.
But then the news channel would be forced to go back to the London Tonight Studio.
If it's SMG who are paying for the programme, I'd doubt they'd want to spend £1 million on a replica set, unless they went half and half with one for the news channel.
Of course there's now the spare studio that five news used, either this proposed SMG service could go in there or the news channel could go in there when they can't go in the main studio.
What does this mean for ITV Border, would Border Scotland opt in for the Scottish bulletin, or would the WHOLE region coninue with Trevor's bulletin ?
I guess we'd get the English one. When the regulators refer to Scotland, they really mean the bit north of a line between Girvan and Dunbar - South Scotland simply doesn't exist.
On the subject of Border receiving the Scottish 1030 - Border Scotland probably would take it. Border's Scotland opt-out already takes Scotsport and, I believe, Politics Now.
Getting back to the actual show - The whole thing is bizarre. A Scottish 1030 is a good idea. However, why does it have to be presented from London? Why not present the show from Glasgow? ITN could send up national stories, like they already do for the 3pm Scotland Today bulletin. They've already suggested the presenter will be Scottish so they'll probably have to pay someone like Shereen Nanjiani or Sarah Heaney a small fortune to move down to London and present a show for Scotland! It's just BIZARRE! Let's look at Sky News Ireland - If you're not aware of it, basically a year ago Sky News begun producing a dedicated Irish programme, which goes out in Ireland at 7pm and 10pm. It's produced and presented from Dublin with correspondents across the Island and draws on the resources of Sky in London and across the world. It doesn't come from London! I think this is an indication that SMG wants to get ITN to do all it's news from London. First the 1030, then the 6?
Bizarre. As far as I can see it SMG are just desperate to get rid of the 2pm bulletin (as are we all), and they want a bargaining chip to take to OFCOM to do it. Threfore, they'll say they'll do a special Scottish version of the 10.30pm news. The question I suppose is whether they'll save any money from paying ITN to do it, rather than producing it up here.
Of course, the whole exercise could be a lot less ambitious than we reckon. The only problem with the ITV News at the moment is that the sport is so heavily slanted towards England, they occasionally refer to programmes on next 'on ITV1' that aren't on up here, and there's a slight M25 bias. SMG will probably just send one Scottish report down, and ask ITN to miss out the cricket.
It does seem so clumsy though - if you're going to do this, why not do it right? But then I suppose SMG are always looking to cut corners.
The only thing I can think of is that I'm not sure whether SMG are allowed to drop ITN bulletins. In the days when Lord Macdonald was Scottish Television chief and not a Labour peer, he said he wanted to do a Scottish Six but couldn't because the station was compelled to take the ITN news. Is that still the case? If so, is this a way round this restriction?
We are assuming, of course, they actually do it. This could be quietly dropped once they get their 2pm news done away with.
I agree with p_c_u_k, there won't be a radical change in the look of the 1030 news. From what I understand there will still be a Scotland Today regional opt at 1050 and all ITN will be doing is producing the 1030 but with less emphasis on the "in England and Wales" stories. There will also presumably be no repetition between the network news and the regional opt, for example, the most recent example is the Jodi Jones murder verdict. However, would that reflect badly on STV if that sort of major story wasn't being covered in the opt under the Scotland Today brand?
p_c_u_k posted:
The only thing I can think of is that I'm not sure whether SMG are allowed to drop ITN bulletins. In the days when Lord Macdonald was Scottish Television chief and not a Labour peer, he said he wanted to do a Scottish Six but couldn't because the station was compelled to take the ITN news. Is that still the case? If so, is this a way round this restriction?
I think there is still a stipulation in the Communications Act 2003 that the regions must carry international and national news provided by the Channel 3 appointed news provided - ITN.
There are occasional problems when SMG and ITN cover the same stories. As the SMG programme is first at 6, they see no problem with using the same footage because they've got it first. But at 10.30pm it looks stupid when Scotland Today repeat the exact same interviews etc as the network news (especially during the headline sequence). Presumably if SMG and ITN actually talk to each other, and direct the show, then they can avoid this. It could also work for ITV PLC as well, because they're more likely to know what's going on up here, and they'll have a better handle on what to use for the ITV News Channel. (This is assuming that Scotland Today and North Tonight are retained at night at all).
It would be a waste if they don't use Scottish stories during the new 'national' news though, so perhaps the 10.50pm opt could be used as more a differentiation between Scottish and Grampian stories, or a chance to go more in-depth about stories in either region.
I had also heard there's the possibility that SMG may use their micro-regions for news as well as advertising (ie perhaps doing opts for Glasgow and Edinburgh etc). Has anyone heard anything about that? Sounds like the sort of thing they'd suggest, then quietly drop, if mention it at all.
Presumably given the communications act using ITN is compulsory - it is a shame though (albeit convenient perhaps for SMG) as it would be interesting to see a completely Scottish 10.30pm.