STV loses news bulletin contract

Oh please have you SEEN the evening telegraph? Their attempts at photoshopping always make me laugh heartily

Also remember this is the paper that parrots the most ignorant moany morons without question. The woman who wanted a new fridge off the council because she threw out her old one that worked fine and claimed her "medicine" was being eaten by birds because she had to leave it on the window was my favourite.

Hmm.. fair point.

I meant the Evening Express and Press and Journal in Aberdeen. However the Evening Telegraph's getting a new editor, so things could be looking up there.

There certainly seem to be some similarities here, and no doubt any behind-the-scenes shenanigans will be revealed in due course.

However, haven't the Tories said that they will scrap plans for IFNCs if they form part/all of the the next government?

Yes, well, "if".

With a high level of hindsight, it does seem to have been politically nieve to promote a Scottish Six. Labour has a long record of being against this - http://www.pressgazette.co.uk/story.asp?storyCode=24227&sectioncode=1 - why would they have any interest in any programme which promotes Scotland as a more independent country?

The impact on STV North could also have been large and seen by some as shutting the north by the back door.

And of course, there's a decent argument that STV should be providing this service without having to beg for public money to do it. They do after all have a prime spot on Freeview and Sky in return for their public service commitments.

But putting all that aside, STV has a proven record in providing an excellent news service, one which is often far better than its BBC counterpart. It has been innovative in providing the opt-outs. I find it hard to believe the replacement service is going to be any better, and some of the guff that's on their one page website sounds like Five News at best and amateurish at worst.

While the majority of punters won't give a toss about regional news, for those that care, these pilots will be a noose around this Labour government's neck. And the worst case scenario of them has come to pass - we're already questioning quite why some of the decisions have been made. How can any of the reporters in any of these programmes feel safe to report a critical story about the Government knowing that said Government has the ability to terminate their contract?

STV Central handled that quite well - a very balanced report, and one in which the new consortium actually came across quite well. Some reference to the money being spent on it all, and the fact it was 'newspaper giants' who had won it, but that's really reading too much into the script.

No quip at the end of from John, but the last shot, which often shows the squinty bridge or a shot of the STV building in general did an unusual zoom straight into the (old, sadly) STV logo on the Glasgow building. Again, may be reading too much into that.

All credit to the staff for getting through it professionally though - can't have been easy today.

It will be an uncertain time for them but I'd have thought that most staff should move over to the new producers.

All may not be lost for STV:

http://news.scotsman.com/scotland/Scheme-to-revamp-Scottish-TV.6192526.jp

Not new news, it was announced by the Conservatives in February and I posted here - TV Forum about Hunt's statement then.