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Tyne Tees Television
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Tyne Tees Television (later ITV Tyne Tees) is the ITV television franchise for North East England and North Yorkshire. The structure of the company has altered across its history, notably in various mergers with Yorkshire Television, and then the larger regional companies that would eventually control the entire ITV network. Currently, the Tyne Tees franchise forms part of a non-franchise ITV Tyne Tees & Border region, shared with the ITV Border region.
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Tyne Tees Television (later ITV Tyne Tees) is the ITV television franchise for North East England and North Yorkshire. The structure of the company has altered across its history, notably in various mergers with Yorkshire Television, and then the larger regional companies that would eventually control the entire ITV network. Currently, the Tyne Tees franchise forms part of a non-franchise ITV Tyne Tees & Border region, shared with the ITV Border region. The station is owned and operated by ITV plc under the licensee of ITV Broadcasting Limited (formerly Anglia Television Limited). It is led by Graeme Thompson, who is the regional director for ITV Tyne Tees and ITV Border.
The station launched on 15th January 1959 from studios at a converted warehouse in City Road, Newcastle upon Tyne, remaining in the city until July 2005 when the station moved to smaller studios located near The Metro Centre in Gateshead. The station has contributed various programming to the ITV network and Channel 4, as well as its regional output. Some of its best known programming include the groundbreaking music show The Tube and critically acclaimed adaptations of Catherine Cookson novels. Its current regional news programme is North East Tonight.
Transmitters in the Tyne Tees region are expected to switch off their analogue signals in 2012, one of the last ITV regions to do so.
History
After a financially difficult time for the first ITV companies, the Independent Television Authority (ITA) decided to roll out independent television to the rest of the country and advertised for bids. Several offers were submitted, including from the existing four companies, to the ITA for the regional ITV contractor to broadcast from the Burnhope transmitter in County Durham. Sir Richard Pease headed a local consortium that included film producer Sidney Box and News Chronicle executives George and Alfred Black. This consortium, was chosen from amongst eleven applicants because of its strong local links, commitment to local programming, concentrating on regional topical matters, and educational and children's programmes. The contract was awarded on 12 December 1957. Experienced television executive Anthony Jelly was appointed as managing director, although historian Andrew Spicer credits the Black brothers as the driving force and public face of Tyne Tees; George was programme director, and both brothers were prominent board members.
The station is named after two of the region's three primary rivers. ITA considered the original name, 'North East England', was imprecise. Some of the consortium's suggestions were rejected: 'Three Rivers Television' for being obscure, and 'Tyne, Wear, and Tees' for being too long. Eventually, in October 1958, the name 'Tyne Tees' was announced. The other major river, the Wear (which runs between the Tyne and the Tees), was represented within the company's early signature tune Three Rivers Fantasy, a specially commissioned work by composer and arranger Arthur Wilkinson, which merged several regional folk tunes, ending in The "Blaydon Races". The nautical theme was also reflected in the station's first logo, where the triple Ts morphed from an anchor.
Two furniture warehouses were purchased on City Road in Newcastle and converted into a studio and office complex. The location was chosen because of its proximity to the telephone exchange in Carliol Square. The complex initially contained four studios, with a fifth built in 1981 to accommodate productions for Channel 4.
Tyne Tees went on air at 5.00pm on 15 January 1959, three years after the first British independent television station. The then-prime minister Harold Macmillan was interviewed live on the opening night, followed by a live variety show, named The Big Show, from a small studio. In the 2006 documentary A History of Tyneside, veteran North East newsreader Mike Neville suggested that the launch of the station enabled local people to be able to hear local accents and dialects on television, since early broadcasters, particularly those from the BBC, tended to speak in Received Pronunciation.
The 1962 Pilkington Report criticised ITV, and Tyne Tees in particular. Some companies, historian Simon Cherry notes, were scrambling very readily for the lowest common denominator... Tyne Tees was notorious for avoiding minority programmes and putting out cop shows or westerns instead.
1970s
Pilkington prompted the government to impose a levy on ITV's revenue, the effects of which were heightened by a recession in 1970 when revenue had declined by 12 per cent in real terms. Despite the levy being reduced, Tyne Tees was one of the contractors facing collapse. To ensure the station's survival, the ITA allowed it to affiliate with Yorkshire Television under a joint management company named 'Trident Television'. The third 'prong' of Trident was intended to be Anglia Television, but the IBA ruled out their involvement. Trident Television was formed in March 1969 as a joint venture to sell adverts for the two companies. Yorkshire and Tyne Tees then came under Trident's ownership on 1 January 1974. For the first time, one company owned two distinct and separate ITV franchises although the new company was dominated by the larger, stronger Yorkshire whose shareholders owned 71.5% of the new company.
A major factor in the merger was that when UHF transmission was introduced in 1969 to accommodate colour television it was found that the key Bilsdale transmitting station in North Yorkshire so dominated the territories of both companies that its allotment to either individual company would have seriously prejudiced the coverage and sales revenue of the other. The ITA agreed that Tyne Tees and Yorkshire could be considered as one company for the purposes of selling airtime, whilst expressing their individual identities in their programming output.
1980s
Trident became redundant as business became healthier. The stations were required to demerge from January 1982 as a condition of the renewal of their ITV franchises. The Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA), the successor to the ITA, imposed the condition that for the 1980 franchise round a company could only own one franchise, although it could earn up to 30% of another. When the new licenses started in January 1982, Trident sold all but 30% of Yorkshire, and 25% of Tyne Tees.
However, developments in satellite and cable television, in addition to the two BBC channels and the new Channel 4, began to put pressure on ITV's finances. ITV lost 3% of advertising between 1993 and 1994. Media historian Andrew Crisell comments that it was beginning to make even less sense to operate a regional structure in such a small a country as Britain.
1990s
In 1990, Yorkshire bought Vaux Breweries' 19% stake in Tyne Tees, costing £5.1million. A year later, Tyne Tees retained its franchise in the blind auction system initiated by Margaret Thatcher in the Broadcasting Act 1990, outbidding their main competition by £10million. Their main challenger was 'North East Television', which was backed by Granada, Border and local newspaper the Evening Chronicle. Along with HTV and Yorkshire, Tyne Tees believed that they had to bid high to win. These companies bid so high that the Independent Television Commission seriously considered rejecting the business plans of each in turn and disqualifying them. However, they eventually decided in their favour. Together, the now-merged companies were committed to paying about £80 million a year to the government for the right to broadcast, a substantial amount compared to the £3,000 bid by Central, ITV's largest station.
New regulations from the ITC allowed Yorkshire to takeover Tyne Tees, this time under the name Yorkshire-Tyne Tees Television plc, although their ITV franchises remained separate. The merger led to the culling of staff. This was the first step to ITV becoming one company in England and Wales. YTTTV's two largest shareholders became Pearson and London Weekend Television. From 1 January 1993, Yorkshire Television and Tyne Tees broadcast all regional programmes simultaneously, affecting programming that had been shown at different paces in different regions (such as Blockbusters and the Australian soap operas The Young Doctors and Prisoner: Cell Block H). Most of the regional programming was produced by Yorkshire and broadcast across the two stations, an area that the ITC considered too broad to be considered of local interest.
The annual cost of the franchise began to take its toll on the company. At the end of 1993, the company revealed that it was heading for a pre-tax loss in the 1992-93 fiscal year instead of the expected profit. Chairman and chief executive Clive Leach was sacked as a consequence. According to Variety, YTTTV oversold its airtime to advertisers and failed to meet its ratings targets, resulting in a huge revenue shortfall estimated by analysts at over £20 million. The industry newspaper also reported that the company attempted to bolster its flagging 1992-93 revenues by giving advertisers deep discounts for advance airtime bookings made for the following year.
On 16 March 1996, the presentation department in Newcastle was closed, with continuity being centralised in Leeds (transmission for the station had already been handled by YTV since 1993). Later that year Yorkshire Tyne Tees Television made the controversial move of dual branding its stations as Channel 3. The Broadcasting Act 1990 had made Channel 3 the 'official' name for ITV, and 'three' was the preset used by most television sets and VCRs for ITV. Tyne Tees Television was forced to use the rather long-winded name "Channel 3 North East - Tyne Tees Television". The famous "TTTV" logo was dropped in favour of a large '3'. The name "Tyne Tees Television" was only seen in small letters at the bottom of the screen. Its neighbour, Yorkshire Television, was allowed to keep its own logo alongside the '3', but Tyne Tees was not. The new branding was launched on 2 September 1996, with "Going Home (The Theme of the Local Hero)" by Mark Knopfler regularly accompanying ident sequences.
In 1997, Yorkshire Tyne Tees Television plc was acquired by the Granada Media Group plc (now ITV plc). One of Granada's first moves was to scrap the-often derided Channel 3 branding. The "TTTV" logo returned to television screens in a new form on 9 March 1998. However, dual branding with the "ITV" name was introduced a year later. In 2000, a new logo and collection of identities was created for use before news and regional programmes. The TTTV logo was re-styled in a new typeface and partially surrounded by a group of dots that progressively faded at either end. The "hearts" ident (used before network programmes) still featured the old style 1998 logo, making Tyne Tees one of the only broadcasters to use two different corporate logos simultaneously. By this point, Tyne Tees' major shareholders were London Weekend Television, MAI Media Holdings, Allquiet Investments, and the Granada Group.
The new guidelines, published by the ITC in 1998, about the Channel 3 licence renewals signalled substantial cuts in the companies' payments to the Treasury. Licences awarded in 1991 were due to expire in January 2001. However, companies, including Tyne Tees, who had big high in 1991 were allowed to apply early to try to win some financial relief. The new ten-year contract would begin from January 1999. In 1999, the cost of the tender fee that Tyne Tees was paying fell to £46m, from the £70.5m that they paid in 1998.
2000s
Tyne Tees Television was rebranded as ITV1 Tyne Tees on 28 October 2002. The name "Tyne Tees" only appears before regional programmes; the rest of the time, only the name "ITV1" is shown. The Tyne Tees logo continued to appear after its own programmes. In 2004, Granada and Carlton merged, creating a single company for all ITV franchises in England and Wales. Tyne Tees became part of ITV plc, the largest television production company in the world who now owned 90% of ITV. One of the consequences of the merger was (according to the company) an over-capacity of studio facilities and production units around the country, which had previously been rivals, but were now all part of the same group. In order to make cost savings, several large regional headquarters, studio sites and programme departments closed and merged. The decision was taken to close the City Road studios and relocate to a smaller purpose built complex housing a newsroom and studio, resulting in the loss of up to 30 jobs. A documentary about the move to new premises, The Big Move, reflected that over the years the staff numbers had dropped by about 800, and around 170 people would be moving to the new site.
ITV Tyne Tees moved to Television House at The Watermark, a new business park adjacent to the MetroCentre in Gateshead, in 2005. The first broadcast from their new base took place on 2 July 2005. Along with the move, news reporters had to learn a range of new skills, such as editing their own reports. The new practices contrast with early reporting, which had an average crew of five, with current equipment only needing a camera operator, who could also operate sound equipment, and a reporter.
Television House also acts as a base for ITV SignPost, Britain's biggest supplier of British Sign Language (BSL) services for television, video, CD-ROM, DVD, film and the Internet. Tyne Tees also has smaller studios and offices in Billingham, York, London and within the Media Centre at the University of Sunderland.
On 9 February 2005, Ofcom issued a proposed timetable for ending analogue terrestrial television transmissions as part of the switchover to digital television. Tyne Tees is the penultimate station scheduled to cease broadcasting in analogue, with a target year of 2012. Tyne Tees took over the relay transmitter at Berwick-upon-Tweed in December 2006 from Border Television in order to extend the deadline of the town's upgrade to digital TV by four years, since Border will be the first to switch off its analogue signal in 2008.
In September 2007, Michael Grade announced that as part of ITV's five-year business strategy, Tyne Tees' newsroom will merge with Border Television. Politicians have expressed concern, however, that the merger would effect the quality of news for southern Scotland, in particular, would fall if it lost its customised bulletins. The changes would mean that aside the merged Border-Tyne Tees regional news and political programmes, the station could broadcast only twenty five minutes of dedicated North East news every weekday. In October 2008, the National Union of Journalists threatened industrial action if ITV tried to force any of the changes without discussion.
Between December 2008 and February 2009, around 50 staff at the station were made redundant or accepted voluntary redundancy, including presenters, journalists and production staff. The new merged ITV Tyne Tees & Border service launched on Wednesday 25th February 2009.
Programming
The bulk of Tyne Tees' output has been its regional programming, consisting of news, current affairs and local interest. Its longest running news programme was Northern Life, which ran from 1976-92. The main news show has been rebranded several times, with the current version being North East Tonight. Local interest programming is now usually broadcast at 19:30 on Thursdays, which are low profile slots due to the high-rating EastEnders being broadcast at those times on BBC One. Local programming is also broadcast on early Sunday evenings and various late slots following News at Ten on Tuesday and Thursday nights. Such documentaries concentrate upon local history, landscape and architecture, such as the various shows by John Grundy.
Tyne Tees was obliged to contribute programming for the ITV network, although the bulk of network programming was purchased from the largest stations. Tyne Tees contributed gameshows to the network, including Crosswits (1985-98), which was replaced by Chain Letters (1987-97). Tyne Tees became a prolific producer of children's entertainment for the ITV network in the 1970s and '80s. From the late 1970s, it produced series such as The Paper Lads, Quest of Eagles, Barriers and Andy Robson. This continued into the '80s with How Dare You!, and weekday pop music show Razzamatazz, a pop programme that attracted many major recording artists to appear in a 17:15 slot. Tyne Tees also managed the production of Get Fresh, a Saturday morning that would be hosted in various weeks by different ITV regions. Supergran, based on a series of books about a grandmother with superhuman powers, was also successful in the mid-1980s.
With independent production company Festival Films and Television, Tyne Tees produced several adaptations of books by local novelist Catherine Cookson. The second dramatisation, The Black Velvet Gown, was the number one drama of 1991, winning an Emmy Award for best TV drama.
Tyne Tees has also produced a wide range of music programming. One of the first attempts at reaching the teenage audience was Young at Heart, hosted by Jimmy Savile and Valerie Masters. It launched in May 1960, and lasted for eight editions. In 1979, Tyne Tees launched two national series, Alright Now and Check it Out, the latter a mix of rock music and segments on youth-oriented social issues; among performances by established acts, the two shows offered early exposure to bands linked to the North East, notably Dire Straits and The Police.
The most famous music show from the station, though, derived its name from the studios themselves. Produced for Channel 4, and first broadcast three days after the new station's launch in November 1982, The Tube acquired its name from the architecture of the public entrance to Studio 5, from where the show was broadcast, at the City Road complex. Under the direction of Gavin Taylor, The Tube filmed Queen's 1986 Wembley concert for later broadcast and video release. Cameras bearing the Tyne Tees logo can be seen throughout the concert. The Tube was axed in 1987 as a result of falling audience figures, with Jools Holland swearing during a live trailer not helping. A couple of months later, Tyne Tees launched another music show, this time for the ITV network. Whereas The Tube featured rock and punk bands and emerging musicians, The Roxy, concentrated on the mainstream UK singles chart. The show suffered, however, from not having a regular slot on the ITV network. Also, unlike The Tube, which had gained a loyal fanbase and respect from artists, mainstream acts were reluctant to travel to Newcastle for a three-minute performance when they could appear on the more established Top of the Pops in the more accessible London.
Further reading
General
Specific
External links
- at itvlocal.com
- - an unofficial site with many articles detailing the history of the station, along with aspects such as continuity and news presentation.
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