2 January – British television premiere of the supernatural horror Poltergeist on BBC1.[1]
3 January – Closedowns reappear on Yorkshire Television when its experiment with 24-hour television is put on hiatus. The channel does continue with into-the-night broadcasts however by becoming the second ITV region to launch a Jobfinder service, broadcasting for an hour after closedown.
12 January – The five-part Australian World War I drama Anzacs makes its British television debut on BBC1.[2]
16 January – The Zircon affair becomes public knowledge when The Guardian reports that the government ordered the BBC to shelve a documentary in the Secret Society series about the Zircon satellite. Two days later documentary maker Duncan Campbell is subject to an injunction preventing him from discussing or writing about the programme's content, but subsequently writes an article about the episode for the New Statesman.
5 February – Princess Anne appears on sports quiz A Question of Sport, a matter of weeks after team captain Emlyn Hughes famously mistook a picture of her on a horse for jockey John Reid. The episode gains a record audience of 19 million viewers.
21 February – An apparently inebriated Oliver Reed appears on the ITV chat show Aspel & Company, where he stumbles and lurches around the set.
24 February – The sitcom Hardwicke House makes its debut on ITV. The series is badly received by critics and viewers and is cancelled after just two episodes (the second broadcast the following evening). The remaining five episodes of the series have never been transmitted.
27 February – The BBC and independent television begins a week of programming aimed at educating people about the AIDS virus. Highlights include AIDS – The Facts on BBC1, a short programme of facts and figures covering frequently asked questions about the disease, and First AIDS, an ITV comedy-sketch programme produced by London Weekend Television and featuring Mike Smith, Jonathan Ross and Emma Freud.[3][4]
9 March – Debut of Central Television's Intimate Contact, a drama dealing with the issue of AIDS.
21 March – Opportunity Knocks returns to British television after a decade-long break, now on BBC1. It is presented by Bob Monkhouse and airs under the title Bob Says Opportunity Knocks.[6]
April
6 April – Thomas the Tank Engine and Friends one of the long running children's television series in Britain goes to air in Australia for the very first time on ABC.
24 April – The Channel 4 music series The Tube is shown for the final time.
25 April –
The Australiansoap operaPrisoner: Cell Block H makes its debut on Central Television in the Midlands. This is believed by many viewers to be the series debut on British television, but in fact it had been running in the Yorkshire region since 1984. Central were the first region to conclude the series, however, in December 1991.
Central becomes the first station to keep its transmitters on air all night when it launches More Central. Programmes are shown into the early hours with the rest of the night filled by its Jobfinder service, which airs from closedown until the start of TV-am.[8]
US prime time sitcom ALF gets its first broadcasting on television screens in the UK on ITV.
26 April –
Channel 4's The Tube airs for the last time after five series.
After more than 30 years, the final edition of Asian Magazine is broadcast on BBC1.[9]
28 April – After nearly ten years on air, the final edition of the weekly magazine programme aimed at Asian women, Gharbar is broadcast.[10] Both programmes are to be replaced by a new programme later in the year.
May
1 May – Launch of the late night discussion programme After Dark, airing on Channel 4.
3 May – The first of two series of groundbreaking youth television show Network 7 starts airing on Channel 4. The programme is shown live at Sunday lunchtime.
22 May–20 June – BBC TV broadcasts coverage of the first Rugby World Cup from Australia and New Zealand. This is the only time that the BBC has screened the tournament.
June
9 June – Debut of the Tyne Tees produced chart show The Roxy, presented by David Jensen and Kevin Sharkey. The programme is intended as a stablemate for the Independent radio hit parade The Network Chart Show, following a similar format to the BBC's Top of the Pops, but its Newcastle-upon-Tyne location impinges on its ability to secure live performances. The show also suffers from poor ratings because it does not have a regular slot on the ITV network, and is cancelled in April 1988.
19 June – Debut of The Grand Knockout Tournament, an It's a Knockout special featuring members of the British Royal Family alongside sporting and other celebrities. Also known as It's a Royal Knockout, the event attracts much media derision and is deemed to have been a failure, although it raised £1 million for charity.
22 June – The BBC's lunchtime children's programme moves from BBC1 to BBC2. It is shown slightly earlier, at 1.20pm.
29 June – Schools programmes are broadcast on ITV for the last time.
20 July – ITV's lunchtime news programme moves to a 12.30pm slot. Consequently, News at One ends after eleven years on air.
25 July – The first edition of a new weekly programme for the Asian community, Network East, is broadcast. It replaces Asian Magazine and Gharbar, which had ended three months earlier.[12]
August
17 August – Thames/LWT begin 24-hour broadcasting. Anglia also begins 24-hour transmissions at around the same time.
20 August – In the wake of the previous day's Hungerford massacre in which 16 people were shot dead by gun enthusiast Michael Ryan, the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 pull several forthcoming films and programmes containing violence from their schedules. Among them are the 1966 western Nevada Smith, an episode of The Professionals and the 1982 post-apocalyptic film Battletruck. A showing of First Blood is also cancelled.[13]
US animated series DuckTales makes its premiere in the UK on ITV before being broadcast in the USA on Broadcast syndication several days later.
14 September – After 30 years on ITV, ITV Schools moves to Channel 4, allowing ITV to concentrate on building a fully commercial daytime schedule. Consequently Channel 4's weekday programming begins at 9.30am (12noon when schools programmes are not being shown).
21 September – As part of Channel 4’s expanded weekday broadcast hours, the first edition of a weekday business and financial news programme Business Daily is broadcast.
30 September – BBC2 debuts Malcolm McKay's screenplay The Interrogation of John, a film concerning the police questioning of a potential murder suspect.[15] Starring Dennis Quilley, Bill Paterson and Michael Fitzgerald, it later forms the first of a three-part series titled A Wanted Man, which further develops the story and airs in 1989.[16]
October
12 October – BBC1 debuts Going for Gold, a general knowledge quiz presented by Henry Kelly in which contestants from fourteen different European countries compete to become series champion. The winner of the first series, Daphne Hudson (later Daphne Fowler), receives ringside tickets at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, and goes on to become a familiar face on television after appearing in a number of other quizzes, including Fifteen to One and Eggheads.[17][18]
15 October – During a weather forecast, BBCmeteorologistMichael Fish reports "Earlier on today, apparently, a woman rang the BBC and said she heard there was a hurricane on the way; well, if you're watching, don't worry, there isn't, but having said that, actually, the weather will become very windy, but most of the strong winds, incidentally, will be down over Spain and across into France.".[19] Hours later, Britain is hit by the worst storm for 284 years.[20] Fish later drew criticism for the comments, but has since claimed that they referred to Florida, USA, and were linked to a news story immediately preceding the weather bulletin, but had been so widely repeated out of context that the British public remains convinced that he was referring to the approaching storm.
16 October – As a result of the Great Storm of 1987, electrical power to TV-am's studios is lost and an emergency programme has to be transmitted from facilities at Thames Television's Euston Road centre using reports from TV-am's own crews and those of ITN, TSW and TVS. The BBC's Breakfast Time, which would usually come from Lime Grove and was able to broadcast as the studios were without power, as was most of BBC Television Centre at Wood Lane. The early part of the programme was broadcast from the continuity suite at TV Centre usually used for Children's BBC presentation as this area had generator support, before a larger studio was able to be brought into use.
17 October – First showing on British television of Stephen King's The Dead Zone on BBC1. This is the first of three films based on Stephen King works to receive their British television debut over three consecutive Saturdays.[21]
29 October – British television premiere of the popular Spanish animated television series Around the World with Willy Fog.[23] The 26-part series concludes on 28 April 1988.[24]
30 October – The first edition of Channel 4's flagship current affairs documentary series Dispatches is broadcast.
4–18 November – Damon and Debbie becomes the first 'soap bubble'. It was a miniseries which took two characters from Brookside into new locations and their own story.
17 November – Fireman Sam, a children's television series about a fireman voiced and narrated by John Alderton, debuts on BBC1.
22 November – Final edition of the 1987 run of Play Your Cards Right. The series disappeared from ITV after this date, not returning until March 1994.[27]
23 November – The TV-am strike begins after members of the technicians' union the ACTT walk out in a dispute over the station's ‘Caring Christmas Campaign’. What is meant to be a 24-hour stoppage continues for several months when staff are locked out by Managing Director Bruce Gyngell. TV-am is unable to broadcast Good Morning Britain, the regular format is replaced with shows such as Flipper, Batman and Happy Days. By December a skeleton service that sees non-technical staff operating cameras and Gyngell himself directing proceedings, begin to allow Good Morning Britain to start broadcasting again. The strikers are eventually sacked and replaced with non union staff. Viewing figures remain high throughout the disruption, which continues well into 1988, although normal programming gradually resumes. Other ITV stations later follow Gyngell's example.
November – Tyne Tees begins 24-hour broadcasting. It does so by launching a Jobfinder service which broadcasts each night from its usual close-down time until the start of TV-am at 6am.
December
December – Thamesside TV, an unlicensed TV station set up by Thameside Radio, goes on air in the same city. There were only two known broadcasts in December 1987.[28][29]
ITV enjoys a record-breaking audience when more than 26 million viewers tune in for the Christmas Day episode of Coronation Street, in which Hilda Ogden (Jean Alexander) makes her last appearance in the show after 23 years.
31 December –
In an unusual move for a pre-recorded television series, the Chimes of Big Ben are integrated into an episode of EastEnders on BBC1. Character Den Watts (Leslie Grantham) brought a television into the bar of the Queen Vic, 'watched' the chimes in their entirety, and the episode resumed.[31]
BBC2 airs a five hour Whistle Test special to welcome in 1988. The special, aired from 9.35pm on New Year's Eve to 2.55am on New Year's Day, takes a look back through the archives in what is the programme's final outing.[32] It will be three decades later in 2018 before a new edition of the programme is broadcast.[33]