ITV News Channel History

*Information taken from Wikipedia.*

## First era: 2000-2005

Originally, the channel launched on 1 August 2000 as a joint venture between ITN and NTL as the "ITN News Channel". In June 2002, Carlton Television and Granada Television - the predecessors of ITV plc - bought out ITN's 65% stake. This led to a rebrand as the ITV News Channel in September 2002. In April 2004 the newly created ITV plc bought NTL's 35% stake to assume full control of the channel.

As the ITN News Channel, it was broadcast from a small studio with accommodation for only one presenter at a time. When relaunched as the ITV News Channel, it initially used the standard ITV News studio of the time, which was built for fixed length bulletins only, so the style of presentation was always more basic than that of its competitors.

From the February 2004 relaunch, the channel came into its own. Along with the rest of ITV News, the channel was presented from the so-called 'theatre of news' set, a large virtual studio allowing presentation either from behind a desk or by presenters walking around, using the news wall to explain a story with the aid of graphics. For the first time, two presenters could present the channel together, which the management viewed as an improvement.

As the channel shares facilities with ITV News bulletins on ITV1 (which are also simulcast on the news channel), it has to move to other studios for around an hour before each ITV1 bulletin to allow for rehearsals. Initially a single locked-off camera studio was used at these times, which was very basic. Later the channel used a virtual reality studio at these times or, following ITN's takeover of the production of *London Tonight*, that studio.

News content and programming for the channel was provided by ITN.

### 2005 closure

In December 2005 it was confirmed that the channel would close down in 2006, in order to use its Freeview bandwidth (which was already timeshared with ITV4) to launch the CITV channel based on the existing CITV brand, and to use its funding to boost ITV News coverage on the main ITV Network. But on 15 December 2005 the decision was taken to close the ITV News Channel.

The closure was subsequently brought forward and the channel closed down on Friday 23 December 2005 at 18:00 (GMT). The reason given was that it would have been unfair to expect the channel's staff to work long hours over Christmas knowing that the channel would soon be closing.

The schedule for the last day of transmission on the ITV News Channel:

* **0700** *The Scott Chisholm Show*
* **1000** *ITV News Live with Alastair Stewart*
* **1145** *The Scott Chisholm Show*
* **1230** *ITV Lunchtime News* simulcast
* **1330** *ITV News Live with Faye Barker*
* **1500** *ITV News Live with Nicholas Owen and Nina Hossain*
* **1600** *ITV News Live with Owen Thomas and Faye Barker*
* **1730** SPECIAL: *5 Years Of the News Channel*, presented by Alastair Stewart.

At the end of the final programme, Alastair Stewart closed the channel with the words:

> "*So that's the end of five years broadcasting as the ITV News Channel. Our thanks to all our contributors, studio and production staff, to all the reporters and correspondents and everyone who made the channel the professional and effective operation that it was. But most of all, you, our viewers. A big thank you to each and every one of you. We hope we both informed and occasionally entertained you over the years. It was our mission to bring you the fastest breaking news and the most comprehensive analysis. We hope that you'll think we succeeded."*
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The picture then faded out and went blank for a few seconds before fading back in to the ITN end board. The station closed shortly afterwards.

## Second era: 2013-present

### 2013 revamp

In Summer 2013, it was confirmed that the ITV News Channel would return after almost 8 years.

At the end of the News at Ten programme broadcast on ITV1 on 25th October 2013, Trevor McDonald closed the programme with the words:

> *"Well, before we go, there is some interesting news about us. Now, as you may have heard that from midnight tomorrow there will be a fresh new look coming to ITV News. But that's not all as we will also see the return of the ITV News Channel. Mary & Mark are standing by in the new set as you can see behind me. So, can you please give us a quick sneak peek of the new set by giving as much detail as possible? (Mary Nightingale & Mark Austin demonstrate the new set) Thank you. And that's nearly all for tonight - coming up as usual, the national weather and the news where you are. So, from me - for the final time in this iconic yellow set - it's goodnight and goodbye."*
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The programme then ended with Trevor McDonald leaving the set with the lights dimming down, followed by the end credits and the last showing of the 2007 ITN endboard (which later mistakenly showed as a result in a minor technical problem on 2nd November 2022 - see *Technical Problems* below). ITV1 bulletins are now rehearsed in that studio where the set once stood.

The channel relaunched at midnight on 26th October 2013 on all platforms as part of an ITV News revamp, albeit looking similar to how the branding looked like back in 2004. The revamp included a new-style "Theatre of News" set (so that the presenters would now be able to walk around and use a news wall to explain a story again) and on-screen graphics. The logo also looked somewhat similar to the one previously used by ITV News in 2004-06 (2004-05 on the News Channel). In September 2014, GMTV started simulcasting on the ITV News Channel, but with the local news slot showing UK-wide bulletins instead (the bulletins are known as *ITV News UK*).

Less than a year after the revamp, the countdown at the top of the hour was given a slight visual refresh - the numbers that indicate the seconds until the hour were moved from the bottom-left to the bottom-right of the screen in order to include the current date and time which is usually shown on the bottom-left of the screen during the bulletins and other news programmes on the channel.

### 2016 revamp

In line with the rebrand of ITV on 3rd March 2016, another major revamp took place across the ITV News network. The changes within this revamp include a brand new logo, brand new graphics, brand new music (a rearrangement of signature tune *The Awakening)* and a new countdown. The 2013 set was given a lick of paint using ITN's Blue & White colour scheme. In January 2021, following the closure of the ITN website, the countdown was given a visual refresh by replacing the on-screen animations with live-action footage filmed prior to COVID-19.

News content and programming is provided and produced by ITN and, since January 2021, Albert Sustainable Productions.

On 1st January 2022, an annual ITV News Channel Countdown Compilation was shown on the channel for the first time. The compilation starts with the original ITN News Channel countdown from 2000 and ends with the current one.

In June 2023 ITV News Plus, an interactive news service on the channel, was made available on all smart TVs and set-top boxes from 2017 onwards. Viewers can access this by simply pressing the red button on their remote control and most pages on the service are accessible to viewers who have their hearing or visuals impaired.

### Technical Problems

#### ***New Year Live 2014***

Around 15 seconds after Big Ben struck midnight on Wednesday 1st January 2014, the channel froze right through to the end of the programme as a result of missing most of the 5-minute fireworks display. This also caused the remaining transmission to be broadcast on ITV1 where they did not miss the fireworks. It was later reported that Ofcom had cleared ITV over this, despite receiving complaints from many viewers about what had happened.

#### ***ITV News Live, 31st March 2014***

##### **Graphics failed to remove throughout commercial break**

During the first break of the 7pm bulletin on Monday 31st March 2014, a technical fault had occurred which resulted with the graphics failing to disappear throughout the break.

##### **Fire alarm unexpectedly interrupts the 9pm bulletin**

Later on that evening, another technical fault had occurred throughout the 9pm bulletin when a fire alarm had gone off unexpectedly in ITV's London South Bank headquarters, which resulted in the loss of the bulletin. All presenters and production staff were asked to stand outside during the fire drill, and recorded footage was temporarily aired on the channel until the fault was fixed at 10pm.

#### ***News at Ten, 6th November 2015***

At 9.59pm on Friday 6th November 2015, the 60-second countdown to 10 o'clock failed to show, as a result of the channel cutting to Trevor McDonald & Julie Etchingham preparing to read the News at Ten bulletin.

#### ***ITV News Live 4pm broadcast, 20th June 2018***

On Wednesday 20th June 2018, a technical fault had occurred as a result of the channel freezing throughout the 4pm bulletin and into the first 30 minutes of the 5pm bulletin, and instead aired recorded footage until the problem was fixed 1.5 hours later.

#### ***First HD broadcast of "Saving Our World"***

At 7pm on Thursday 3rd January 2019, ITV News Channel's first HD documentary broadcast of "Saving Our World" reportedly suffered some technical problems which resulted in poor picture quality and constant cutting to the ITV News Channel logo throughout the programme, although the standard definition version of the channel seemed to work like normal. The problem was later fixed when the documentary was repeated the following Saturday.

#### ***ITV News Channel temporarily goes off air due to a massive power cut in ITV's South Bank HQ***

In the early hours of the morning on Tuesday 16th February 2021, a huge power failure had occured at ITV HQ which resulted with all ITV channels being temporarily taken off air, including the ITV News Channel. The channels remained off-air until the fault was repaired the following day.

#### ***ITV News 6pm bulletin, 2nd November 2022***

At the end of the 6.30pm bulletin on Wednesday 2nd November 2022, the red variant of the 2007 ITN endboard was accidentally shown instead of the current one used since 2018. The same thing happened on ITV1 where the bulletin was simulcast with the News Channel.

### ITV News Channel HD

On 1st January 2019, an HD simulcast of the ITV News Channel was launched on Freeview ch108 following the closure of the ITV HD pay-per-view service which lasted almost three years. It then launched onto other HD platforms; Freesat HD was the last platform to receive the channel in 2020, shortly before the COVID-19 Coronavirus pandemic began.

Following the launch of ITV News Channel HD, Sky customers can now switch between full-screen and quarter-screen video formats whilst watching the channel in standard definition, by pressing the 0 button on the Sky remote. The quarter-screen format features a graphic that shows highlights of the day's main headlines, promotional advertisements and the current Met Office weather forecast.

### ITV News Channel on Digital Terrestrial

Initially it was broadcast on ch48 until the collapse of ITV Digital in 2002, then on Freeview ch81 until closure in December 2005. After its relaunch in October 2013 it was broadcast on ch83, and on 3rd September 2014 the channel moved to a higher slot of 133 as part of a reshuffle of the news and children's channels. Following the Freeview clearance in 2017, the channel then moved to a new EPG slot of ch236.

On 27th October 2022, the channel and its HD simulcast were removed from Freeview. However, it can still be streamed on the platform via the worldwide news channel streaming service NewsStream, which can be found on channel 270. Both versions of the news channel continue to broadcast on other platforms, including Sky / Sky Glass & Virgin.

### ITV News Channel on TopUp TV

In April 2017, the channel became available on TopUp TV via subscriber's choice. It was removed from the service on 8th March 2023 when TopUp TV closed down.

### ITV News Channel wins RTS News Channel of the Year

The channel won Royal Television Society News Channel of the Year in 2014, then again in 2017.

### Anniversaries

On 1st August 2015 the channel marked its 15th anniversary since its original launch, and on 26th October 2018 it marked its 5th anniversary since its revival.

On 1st August 2020 the channel celebrated 20 years with a special 3-hour documentary which aired from 8pm until 11pm. The documentary "20 years of the ITV News Channel" featured a look back at those greatest moments that made headlines over the last 20 years, starting with the opening ceremony of the Sydney 2000 Olympics.