Copyright 1997 The Scotsman Publications Ltd.

The Scotsman

July 18, 1997, Friday

SECTION: Pg. 29

LENGTH: 903 words

HEADLINE: 'Star-maker' slips snugly into favourite armchair

BYLINE: Sally Kinnes

BODY:

WHEN Reginald Bosanquet joined ITN in 1955, he was quite clear about his plans. At his interview, he said he wanted to be "a television star" though ITN at the time had other ideas. "I don't know about a television star," came the reply, "but you can be a television teaboy".

A few years later, however, Reggie got his wish. When ITN began News at Ten, it set out to be everything the stuffy BBC was not. It used journalists, not actors; it made them newscasters not newsreaders; it allowed them to develop an on-screen personality and it did indeed turn them into stars.

News at Ten is 30 this month.

It was launched on 3 July, 1967, just too late for the six-day war in the Middle East, the Torrey Canyon Disaster and Sir Francis Chichester's round the world trip. But in plenty of time for the launch of Concorde that December and the world's first human heart transplant.

Not that ITV's managing directors thought News at Ten would last that long. They launched it as a 12-week trial, and according to Sir David Nicholas, its first editor, their thinking was that it could not do much harm in the summer.

News at Ten was radical. It took a broad view of news values, made much greater use of film and pioneered the reporter package. It could not (and still cannot) match the deep pockets of the BBC, but it was not hidebound, as Auntie was. Making a point of using spoken, rather than written English, it was populist and accessible. Copy was tailored to the personality of the newscaster, "couched in the sort of terms he would use if he arrived at a party and imparted to the other guests some bit of news he had just heard," said Bosanquet in his book Let's Get Through Wednesday.

Leonard Parkin, who moved from the Beeb to ITN, summed up what was different about News at Ten: "It's not just a news bulletin, it's a programme."

It was also prepared to have fun. Robin Day ended one programme by saying: "Good night - especially to the charming lady from Beckenham who wrote to me saying I was a swollen headed pipsqueak."

But 30 years on, it is impossible to imagine Trevor McDonald being so bold. News at Ten has developed from being a fast two-hander, then a vehicle for journalistic stars, to a mumsy, user-friendly show presented by the nation's favourite uncle - and McDonald, unlike his frosty deputy, Julia Somerville, never forgets to welcome viewers back after the break.

Avuncular was not, however, the image ITN had intended when McDonald became the single anchor in 1992. The intention had been to develop a US-style star ; a senior authoritative journalist who would look as comfortable in the studio as when reporting from a war zone.

Although McDonald wins every prize going in the popularity stakes, it did not work out that way. It was a difficult assignment, but he looked distinctly uncomfortable doing an on the spot report when the hostage John McCarthy came home; he did himself no favours by presenting the much mocked Royal Debate for Carlton TV and his interview with John Major was so fawning, even the Independent Television Commission rapped ITN's knuckles.

At 30, News at Ten may still be too young for a mid-life crisis, but it has plenty of critics.

"It's become atrociously downmarket,' says David Miller, lecturer in media studies at Stirling University.

"STV's news programmes have become very down market too - there's lots more violent crime and court correspondents - but it's not downmarket in the same way. It's the tone of News at Ten's newscasters and journalists . It's so chatty. It's so daytime TV."

News at Ten has always been populist, but Mr Miller believes that an unashamedly tabloid approach has been introduced.

"It's homely, nostalgic almost, for a vision of the English past.

That was especially visible in their coverage of Hong Kong and that rather sickening attempt to bring a lump to the nation's throat."

News at Ten is facing other pressures. The Scottish Media Group has made it clear that it wants to opt out if there is a Scottish parliament; it has been estimated that ITV could generate an extra £ 45 million in advertising revenue if it moved the news away from 10pm; and the audience is ageing, hence the recent rumour that it wanted to poach the youthful Kirsty Young from Channel 5.

"News at Ten has a very good audience profile in terms of ABC1s," says one academic.

"But its audience is not only diminishing, it's getting older.

News at Ten is seen as continuing the problems of its older profile. Its big strength is that it still covers the big stories well a Its weakness is it does not have the range, or as many correspondents, as the BBC."

The BBC's Six o' Clock news is winning the war of the ratings (an average of 6.5 million viewers at 6pm, compared with 6.2

million for Trevor). But research from the ratings compiler BARB shows more viewers make it to end of News at Ten than they do with the BBC (54 per cent against 49 per cent).

But the real worry for broadcasters is quality. No matter how good or bad the news, it makes little difference to audience share. "All the research shows that in terms of viewing figures, the effect of quality is marginal," says the academic.

"News isn't a great draw a People may trust TV news more than what they read in the papers, but turn on a bulletin, any bulletin, and they slump."

LOAD-DATE: July 18, 1997