ITV Wales & West (old)

Template:Infobox ITV franchisee HTV (originally Harlech Television, later HTV Limited and HTV Group plc and now ITV Wales and West Limited) is the ITV contractor for Wales and the West of England, owned by ITV plc. It took over from TWW in 1968. Its headquarters are based in Cardiff & Bristol. As of 29 December 2006, the company re-named as ITV Wales and West Ltd[1].

History

Unique amongst the network HTV is the only ITV company to officially serve two countries, England and Wales (although the English broadcaster Border Television can be recieved in southern Scotland).

Initially the station used its full name (after the head of the company, Lord Harlech), but from the introduction of colour in 1970 it became HTV. The company won its franchise in circumstances which angered its predecessor TWW and the Independent Television Authority offered them an opportunity to buy shares in HTV, an offer which was declined. TWW left its franchise five months early, selling the remaining air-time to Harlech. This resulted in an emergency service as Harlech were not ready to go on-air.

In 1984 HTV opened new £14m studios at Culverhouse Cross, Cardiff to replace those inherited from TWW at Pontcanna.

Services

HTV operates two separate services: ITV1 Wales (formerly "HTV Cymru Wales") in Wales, and ITV1 West (previously "HTV West", then briefly 'ITV1 West of England') in the West of England area.

Since 28 October 2002, the full name "ITV1 West" has only been seen before local programming on that channel. At all other times, the station is simply called ITV1. However, the name ITV1 Wales is seen before all programmes.

While ITV1 West has shared a team of announcers with the other ITV1 regions in England, since 28 October 2002, ITV1 Wales continued to have its own team of continuity announcers until 16 January 2006, when Welsh continuity was transferred to the main ITV1 announcer team in London. Although only being verbally referred to before regional programming, the channel continues to be visually identified as "ITV1 Wales".

The name HTV has not disappeared completely; it continues to be seen on programmes made for S4C, and some off-air branding also remains under the HTV name. Following the change to the single ITV1 branding, 'HTV' was kept for its news programming, but this was dropped on 2 February, 2004, in favour of ITV Wales News/ITV West News.

Programming

HTV's main programmes include Wales Tonight (ITV1 Wales), The West Tonight (ITV1 West), The Ferret, and Nuts and Bolts. HTV does not now produce much in the way of regular network programming, although it did continue to commission Movies, Games and Videos for some time. Previously, there have been several major HTV commissions for the network, including Robin of Sherwood, Wycliffe and children's programmes including Rubbish, King of the Jumble, The Slow Norris, Captain Starr, and Dog & Duck; HTV also produced the game shows Definition (originally hosted by Don Moss and later Jeremy Beadle), Three Little Words (co-hosted by Ray Alan and his wife Barbie) and Keynotes, co-produced with Reg Grundy Productions.

Since 1982, HTV has provided Welsh language programming to S4C such as Cefn Gwlad, Hacio and Y Byd ar Bedwar, although this is now commissioned rather than produced in-house. Prior to S4C's introduction, HTV's evening news had to be split into two fifteen-minute bulletins, presented from the same studio and separated by an advertising break: Y Dydd (The Day) in Welsh, and Report Wales in English.

Ownership

In 1996, HTV was taken over by United News and Media plc (now United Business Media plc). In 2001, Granada Media plc bought United's television interests, but were forced, by the regulator, to sell HTV to Carlton Communications plc, owners of Carlton Television, though the HTV name was retained on-air until 27 October 2002.

Granada and Carlton were subsequently permitted to merge in 2004 to form the single company ITV plc, which now owns all of the ITV franchises in England and Wales.

Reception

HTV Wales can be received across the UK and Ireland and further afield via satellite on Sky Digital. Its terrestrial signal can also can be received in southeastern parts of Ireland, where it is retransmitted on UHF by so-called 'deflectors', although this is because the UTV region was not historically receivable in those areas by any means in order to be rebroadcast.

File:ITV West new region boundary.png

Extent of ITV West area from December 2006

HTV West is now also broadcast from the Ridge Hill transmitter (on UHF channel 30) and now covers a larger area, as shown on the map. ^[1]. This service is on analogue TV only, and is broadcast in tandem with the ITV Central West service (on UHF channel 25). Digital terrestrial viewers using Ridge Hill only receive Central West.

Presenters

ITV Wales News

Its flagship programme is known as Wales Tonight. All other news bulletins are known as ITV Wales News

Jonathon Hill
Lucy Owen (nee Cohen)
Ruth Wignall (weather)
James Wright (weather)
Charlie Neil (weekend weather)
Emma Jesson (weekend weather)

ITV West News

Its flagship programme is known as The West Tonight. All other news bulletins are known as The West Today/Tonight, dependent on the time of day they are broadcast. With effect from 3 December 2006, following the end of the Central South sub-region and the beginning of ITV West transmissions from Ridge Hill, ITV West took over ITV's Cheltenham regional news office and began covering north and central Gloucestershire for the first time.