"The West Tonight" and "Westcountry Live" to return?

No, there's still the same number of frequencies (in fact there'll be less) and the and still the need to cover the whole country with as few transmitters as possible.

The big difference between the US and here is that the attitude in the UK is to have a regulated and centrally planned/organised TV network to cover the whole country. In the US it's a market based system with smaller stations covering a city... but their cities are spaced further apart and there's minimal coverage between

The areas covered are bigger than you think, a US TV market covering Liverpool would also cover Manchester as they are so close together... and if we had the American system here, those in Burnley wouldn't be covered at all

Will ITV have the power to do this though? I may have completely misunderstood, but I was under the impression that whoever provides the regional news will be appointed by Ofcom, and will be independent of ITV - rather like the original TVam/GMTV breakfast franchise set-up.

Talk about having your cake and eating it too.

When the first unified look was introduced the feeling and audience research showed that in the mind of the viewer there was 'BBC News' and then some other news. The attitude towards regional news was that it wasn't as good quality as the well respected BBC News.

Integrating the regional news upped the perception of it as people associated it as coming from the same organisation as the national news. The way that the 2 news's were integrated on the screen necessitated having a generic look as well - hopping back and forward between studios during the headlines for example

Of course money wasn't the main driver, getting consistant BBC news branding was the point - hence everything from Points West to World News America was given the same branding. They're hardly going to say rebrand everything except North West Tonight!

They're never going to have identical sets, but the title sequences are all based around the same graphics just with different landmarks, they are as near identical as they can be.

Points West's set is similar (in terms of colour scheme and branding) to the national news and North West Tonight's is also similar to the national news set hence when they're seen on air together it gives some consistancy. The point is not to match region with region - it's regional with national

Before the last rebrand they had all drifted apart a lot and it was a bit of a hotchpotch.

I don't think they'd care that much, it's not as if they'll be able to use their programmes to promote other brands. 'The Daily Mail South West Tonight' isn't going to happen.

What's important to them, so they say, is providing the regional news... and of course making money from it. Why should they care that there's a bit of channel branding included?

Not having any 'ITV' in there at all could be to their detriment, especially when trying to establish themselves to their potential audience and contacts - it instantly tells them where to find it. It's like having a local radio station without a frequency in it's name