WESTCOUNTRY TELEVISION

'Westcountry Television' is the ITV franchise holder in the South West of England, replacing its predecessor, TSW (Television South West), on 1 January 1993. It covers Devon, Cornwall, and areas of Somerset and Dorset.
Although Westcountry is intended for Devon and Cornwall and parts of Somerset and West Dorset, it can be picked up in parts of South Wales and even South-West Ireland (i.e Munster). It is common in many area in South Wales for residents to receive Westcountry solely as opposed to official Welsh broadcaster, HTV. Likewise, people in North Devon and North Cornwall can sometimes pick up ITV Wales and RTÉ (the national television service of the Republic of Ireland).
ITV Westcountry has sub-studios in: Penzance, Truro, Plymouth, Exeter, Torbay, Barnstaple, Weymouth, and Taunton as well as the main studio on the Langage Science Park, to the east of Plympton near Plymouth. Plans for a purpose-built studio complex on the Plymouth waterfront had to be abandoned because of TSW's legal challenge to the franchise award. It has four sub-programmes (local news sections) within its main Westcountry News evening programme, covering the West (Truro), East (Exeter), North (Barnstaple) and South (Plymouth) of the Region. It was the first ITV company to do this.
In 2009, Westcountry, along with ITV Wales, ITV West and ITV Granada will cease its analogue broadcasts as part of the switch to digital TV.

Contents

Pre-history

History

Programmes

External links

Pre-history

Westcountry Television was one of two rival consortiums bidding against the incumbent TSW when the ITV franchises were put to tender early in 1991. Westcountry's original shareholders were Brittany Ferries and, controversially, South West Water. On 16 October 1991, Westcountry was announced as the winner, bidding £7 million a year against TSW's 16 million. Several local MPs were concerned that South West Water's involvement would lead to partiality in news items concerning the local water firm. In the beginning the firm was housed at Brittany Ferries' offices in Millbay Docks, Plymouth.
TSW launched a legal challenge to the franchise award, and after initially being refused permission to do so in the High Court a legal action began which would last almost three months and went all the way to the House of Lords. In February 1992, the legal process found in favour of Westcountry, and while they could now finally sign the franchise agreement their original programme plans were hit by the delay.
Following discussions with the Independent Television Commission, Westcountry announced on 01 April 1992 it had abandoned plans for a purpose-built waterfront studio complex in Plymouth, opting instead to convert an industrial unit at Langage Science Park, Plymouth. They also reduced their planned staffing levels - already far fewer than those of TSW - leading to an expression of disappointment by TSW's managing director Harry Turner.

History

Wetscountry, originally an independent company, replaced Television South West at 00:00 GMT on 1 January, 1993. The first programme aired on the channel was a video welcoming viewers to Westcountry and promising higher levels of regional commitment, followed by the Eddie Murphy and Dudley Moore film ''Best Defense''.
In 1996, Westcountry was purchased by Carlton Communications (now ITV plc), who by that time owned the London weekday (Carlton Television) and Midlands (Central) franchises. Subsequently, Westcountry was re-branded as ''Carlton Westcountry'' in September 1999, although only referred on screen as ''Carlton''. On 27 October 2002, Carlton Westcountry lost its regional identity, and became known as ''ITV1 Carlton'' prior to regional programmes only, while being known as ITV1 at all other times. The franchise briefly became ''ITV1 for the Westcountry'' in 2003, before being renamed as ''ITV1 Westcountry'' upon the ITV plc merger of 2004. ''ITV1 Westcountry'' was used for a time after this, although now the regional name is only verbally mentioned before any locally-produced programming.
Following a speech by Michael Grade about regional broadcasting post switchover at the 2007 Nations and Regions conference in Cardiff, there has been speculation that ITV Westcountry and ITV West could merge operations[1], as part of further streamlining of regional operations (other regions affected could include ITV Border and ITV Anglia). Rumours suggest that, while a newsroom (and separate regional identity) would be retained in the south west, the main ''Westcountry Live'' programme would move to a studio alongside ''The West Tonight'' at ITV West in Bristol (akin to the Meridian and Thames Valley news services at Whiteley). While seemingly plausible to many, given the developments at ITV over the years (particularly the branding of the Westcountry portal of ITV Local[2] due to launch soon), these rumours have had no concrete confirmation from any official source at ITV.

Programmes

Westcountry has not made any notable contribution to the ITV network, but produces mainly regional programmes such as ''Westcountry Live'', the main evening news bulletin, as well as several regional factual series.
''Westcountry Live'' presenters are: Sheila Jansen, Peter Wareham, Richard Bath, Nicky Parr, Jemma Woodman, Alexis Bowater and James Wignall. Richard Bath and Alexis Bowater usually present the main programme at 6pm.

★ ''Westcountry Live'' (1993-present)

★ ''Westcountry Update'' - no longer made

★ ''Westcountry Life''

★ ''West Wise''

★ ''Brief Encounters''

★ ''Birthday People'' - discontinued in 2005

External links

★ ITV Westcountry at itvlocal.com

★ Westcountry Television at TV Ark

★ Carlton Westcountry at TV Ark