C4 poaches Paul O'Grady

So once again the incompetence at ITV has shone through for all to see. In the six years since they lost Home and Away this has been their only hit show in that slot. Keeping Paul should have been one of the highest priorites but no, offering the guy a new contract just happens to slip the mind off all these 'super commisioners' and other semi-trained monkeys who work at ITV towers. Congrats to all at Ch4!

Didn't Richard and Judy present the Soap Awards the year after they had left for Channel 4? Or was that just while they were still presenting This Morning?

IIRC they presented the first Soap Awards in the first half of 2001 when they would still have been at ITV.

And where did all the money go that could have kept him there? Yet another rebrand! Seems ITV cares more about its screen image than its product.

WOW I never saw that one coming!! He likes to go where the money is doesn't he? I think Richard and Judy will be the happiest at this news, and it means that The Weakest Link will get really good ratings for six months of the year.

I hope to God they don't extend the debacle that is Richard Hammond's 5 O'Clock Show!!

Quick! Deconsolidate 'ITV P.L.C.', and bring back quality regional independence, and not boring plain, economy 'treat you as number' commercial centralised programming. The regulations should never have changed.

Don't change rules of BBC .

He's still doing that show according to Teletext but if I was ITV I'd drop him immediately. It serves ITV right for giving us $hit like Soapstar Superstars and ripping off the BBC's Strictly Ice Dancing and using David Seamen as well who was on the BBC show!!

They've been cherry picking BBC talent for the last few months let's see how they like it!

If you were ITV you'd drop your highest rated tea-time programme? What a stupid idea.

Erm, remember the entire 3-6.30pm schedule on Channel 4 is presented by people or made up of programmes that used to be on other channels, from Des Lynam to The Simpsons

I thought Channel 4 was supposed to be about innovation and developing their own up and coming stars not just flashing the cash at other channel's stars. They are turning into Channel 5 at this rate!

It's bad news for viewers all round, Paul O'Grady will now only be on 6 months a year, some of this 6 may be at a dodgy time of year, presenting a show that will no doubt be inferior to the one that made him a sucess on ITV. For the remaining 6 months viewers will be stuck with tired old Richard and Judy or even more tired Weakest Link with no competition

No I'd drop him from his Saturday evening show, he's already gone from teatime. When the last series ended at Christmas that was the last Paul O'Grady teatime show for ITV. If Paul has any sense he won't change the show at all, except for minor changes. When stars cross channels what ruins them is that they can't take the format that made them successful.

He can still do programmes in the evening but if I was ITV I wouldn't use him as it would be advertising him for Channel 4. ITV need to find out how his contract ended and they didn't sign him to a new one. But Paul does a lot of these moves, it's all to do with the money and you can't blame him. But gone are the days when you'd see Noel Edmonds and think of him as a BBC star or Michael Aspel as an ITV star.

You never know, this could be something to do with the new rebrand of ITV? : :

Not neccesarily, Ant and Dec would be a good example of stars who are strongly associated with ITV.

Serves ITV for not being quick enough. At least they'll know what to do next time, indeed, if there is a next time, it's not very often ITV gets a breakout hit.