Grampian Television

Template:Infobox ITV franchisee Grampian Television (now legally known as STV North Ltd and referred to on-air as STV) is the ITV franchisee for the North of Scotland, based in Aberdeen. Its coverage area includes the Scottish Highlands (except Fort William and Lochaber which have always received STV), Inverness, Aberdeen, Dundee and parts of north Fife. It has been in operation since 30 September1961.

It is now owned by SMG plc, which also owns the other ITV franchise in Scotland, Scottish Television (now known as STV (Central) on-air), based in Glasgow. STV North's regional news bulletin for the North of Scotland is called North Tonight. Presenters of this programme have included Selina Scott and Anne MacKenzie.

STV North also produces TV programmes in Gaelic, from its studios in Stornoway.

More recent STV North programmes include the popular Beyond Explanation, presented by Dundonian actor Brian Cox, which looked at mysterious sightings across Scotland over the last few centuries. Also produced by stv north is the Scottish crime show Unsolved: Getting Away With Murder, which covered past unsolved criminal cases in Scotland; it was shown across Scotland and drew high viewing figures, while increasing the number of calls made to the police by witnesses of various events who had seen the show.

Less popular STV North shows include Where's Your Head At?, a low-budget production which interviewed a selection of people about seemingly irrelevant issues, but did not gain high ratings.

Both STV North and STV Central, together with their counterpart UTV in Northern Ireland, have resisted adopting the generic ITV1 branding that is now commonplace throughout regions in England and Wales, and the Scottish Borders that are owned by ITV plc.

In 2008, the United Kingdom plans to begin its 5-year programme to cease analogue television broadcasts as part of the switchover to digital television, with STV North switching over from May till October 2010.

History

Applications for the new north of Scotland contract area were sought by the Independent Television Authority in the spring of 1960. From the original seven applicants, three serious contenders emerged and the contract was awarded to North of Scotland Television Limited on the provisio that board positions were offered to the other two final applicants, Caledonian Television and "North Caledonian Television". The company's first managing director was G E Ward Thomas who went on to establish the new Yorkshire Television in 1967/1968.

The name 'North of Scotland TV' was thought to be too cumbersome and to reflect the input of the other applicants a new name was chosen, Grampian Television.

A former tram depot was purchased at Queen's Cross, Aberdeen and was scheduled to be converted to studios by the planned launch date of September, 1961. However, four months prior to launch the Post Office announced that the links which would have connected Grampian to the network would not be ready until February 1962. This would have left the new station only able to broadcast output from its' neighbour Scottish Television (STV).

Pressure at the highest level of Government ensured that the links were in place in time and the station went on air as planned. In the early days Grampian struggled as viewers in a key part of its' transmission area, the city of Dundee were still tuning into coverage from STV. This led to a successful reduction in transmitter rental for Grampian but by 1962 the station had succeeded in increasing audience in the city and the area as a whole.

Prior to the 1968 contract round, smaller regional stations sought an affiliation with one of the four major ITV companies, who would provide the bulk of their programming. Grampian linked up with ABC Weekend Television.

Channel changes

In March 2006, the owners of Grampian Television, SMG plc announced that the Grampian TV brand would be removed from the air and renamed, along with Scottish TV, as simply 'STV', with a new logo comprising a large, stylised letter 'S'. It was also announced that no jobs would be lost, as a result of the rebranding. The two regional news programmes, North Tonight (Grampian TV) and Scotland Today (Scottish TV) are still broadcast in their respective regions after the "stv" rebranding, which occurred on May 30 2006.

The decision to rebrand Grampian has been met with much criticism from across the North of Scotland; this move is similar to the ITV plc-owned licences in England and Wales where all of the regions are branded as ITV1. The objections are largely due to the fact that Scottish culture in the North, which is largely rural, is very different from the Central Scotland area, which is more commercial and industrial. The fact that almost all Scottish ITV output now originates from Glasgow or London has left many viewers feeling unrepresented and ignored.

The advertising is also still regionalised, as before. Grampian's managing director, Derrick Thomson, has now become STV's director of programmes across Scotland.

As of 3 December 2007 the name was partially resurrected at the launch of GMTV Grampian a local news segment for North Scotland shown as part of GMTV and is provided by Macmillan Media a separate company with no connection to SMG plc. It took over the contract when GMTV did not renew SMG's contract to supply early morning Scotland Today and North Today bulletins. SMG had supplied GMTV with its news since the breakfast channel took over from TV-am in 1993. From its Glasgow office, Macmillan Media began its service for the Grampian region on December 3 2007.

External links

• stv.tv