ITV 1979 strike, effect on emmerdale storylines

The return from the strike in intriguing. I've seen Yorkshire coming back, they welcome viewers, announce what's coming up (including "Yorkshire's own 321") and then say they're handing over to Thames for the rest of the evening. I read somewhere Westward did Westward Diary on the first night, I'm not sure where that would have gone, and also apparently ATV showed football highlights at 10.30 on the first night too.

thanks for the info tony, now I understand what it was all about

On the BBC side, I remember an afternoon Look North bulletin going out as a radio style bulletin over the Look North logo, during a strike in the 1980s.

To answer the question about Black Hill....

the ACTT shop had 'blacked' the programmes that failed to appear from the network. Literally. That meant that in these circumstances the Transmission Controller would be instructed by the Shop Steward to fade to black for the duration of the planned programme. Not to do anything else like show a standby or a caption.

If the programme contractor sent black to the transmitter (due to a planned closedown, a catastrophic breakdown or an industrial dispute) for more than 30 seconds, the procedure was for the IBA to take back control. Remember - the IBA was the broadcaster, and it contracted the output to the programme companies. But if they failed to provide it, the IBA took over.

In those far-off days, each main transmitter had a slide scanner, a turntable or tape machines (for playing music), tape machines, an in some cases a telecine machine for showing films. And a microphone for making live announcements.

If there was a strike, the IBA had the power to pick programmes direct from the network, and these were sometimes transmitted 'clean' with no commercials or presentation - simply an apology slide where the commercial breaks should have gone.

When STV's Studio B was destroyed by fire that evening's programmes were run direct from Black Hill, with the continuity announcer filling the breaks with slides, music and live announcements.

As to whether or not STV went through the whole 'startup' each time Black Hill handed back - the answer is no. Black Hill and STV agreed a hand back time and the transmitter simply switched back to the STV feed at a pre-determined time.

Is it 30 years since it started this coming thursday?

There's some more interesting facts and discussion continuing on this subject here:
http://www.mausoleumclubforum.org.uk/xmb/viewthread.php?tid=19191&page=1

It's a fascinating thread.

I found a Corrie related site & it let you search for various things, including strikes.

I found references to strikes in 1962(Equity), 1975(Pay freeze), 1970/1971(Colour Strike), 1961(Extra Time Working & a pay claim), 1967 (Lack Of Bonus Payment), 1968(Franchise changeover), 1969 (Post Office One Day Strike affecting Thames Tv output), 1970 (Granada technicians one month strike, affecting election & World Cup coverage).

http://coronationstreet.wikia.com/wiki/Special:Search?search=strike&go=1

the pay freeze strike was what caused Ernie Bishop to be shot because the actor wanted out as he didn't agree with it

1970/1 colour strike was also why Corrie had to go back to Black and White late 1970/early 1971 when they had originally changed to colour in 1969.

I think it affected most of ITV, there are some episodes of On The Buses that have been shown on ITV3 lately that were in Colour, then back to Black and White and then later back to Colour, ISTR reading somewhere LWT re-recorded some of their shows in Colour after the strike had finished.

The first series of Upstairs Downstairs was a famous casualty of that strike, I don't think the early B&W episodes were remade.

Imagine all the technical staff at our TV stations today going on an HD strike and insisting that everything was made in SD

I guess that as so many technical bods are freelance it would never happen now.