CITV and the regions

Just a thought following on from that Carlton video in the "forgotten" thread but was there any obligation on the regional franchises to produce or commission shows specifically for CITV and Children's ITV beforehand, and what was the commissioning process both pre and post-1993?

I know the smaller regions seemed to get a bit of a look in when it came to childrens shows, but wondering whether that was just them getting their foot in the door or whether it was an obligation, or at the very least seen as good PSB practice to contribute.

Would also be interesting to know a bit more of what happened pre-Children's ITV. I assume the regional licences had a requirement for children's TV and there would have been a necessity to take each others programming.

People believe kids tv was left to the other but that just not true, Thames had the biggest cartoons on CITV, Central create many many series.

There must have been PBS obligation, why else would LWT have local kids programmes ( with pat shape) STV did make kids shows, for STV area from 1993, it was Skoosh, Wemyss Bay 902101, numerous quizzes for kids and a few others. Grampian did the same Whiz up?: The last try was in 2001 with "Inside out" with that bloke who won Fame academy. ( lets forget to WKND@ STV in 2009)

Granada had Hunt the pie? Anglia and swot or wot?

Before Children's ITV was the old Watch It! strand which started in 1980.

In fact Wiki suggests "Watch It! was presented live by the duty continuity announcer in each ITV region. The notion of networking children's continuity was first suggested within ITV as far back as the early 1970s, but with fierce regional identities prevalent - including scheduling, presentation and programming - the idea stalled until the late 1970s, when the IBA began to express concern that most ITV shows for children were not consistent or fully networked."

There was also Tube Mice from TSW.

TSW did have its own Saturday morning show instead of Tiswas and No73, and Gus Honeyburn... Did birthday slot get the tick for Kids PSB?

There is plenty of clips of Local ITV stations doing local Watch it, However thursday was never networked and always seem to have little house of the prairie etc

HTV made quite a few kids shows over the years. Children of the Stones is probably the most famous, but even through the 90s they brought the likes of The Famous Five, Budgie The Helicopter, The Worst Witch and The Wombles to the network.

There was also Rainbow (1994) and er, Rolf's Cartoon Club.

Although they primarily featured childrens' birthdays, wasn't the birthday slot open to all ages? Given it was shown after the regional news at around 3pm, just before CITV, there was an audience of both adults and children.

I know that most regions had a birthday slot at one point. Did any of them have any rules about ages, i.e,. only children, or all ages?

I think I would be right in saying the Cartoon Club was the only main thing Harris did for CITV, in lieu of the fact he came to ITV from the BBC in the first place after Cartoon Time and then buggered off again after four years or so when Animal Hospital came along.

I believe Gus had an age limit, and it wasn't uncommon for adults to write in and lie about their age to get a mention.

Grampian had no age limit. Apart from Border, Grampian and Westcountry did anyone else have birthday slot from 1993 onwards?

Anglia's Birthday Club continued post-1993 until 2002.

And Puffin's Pla(i)ce on Channel TV outlasted weekday CITV broadcasts...