Programming
The two licences still produce regional programmes, although the only difference between them is the respective news programmes and overnight output: STV News at Six and STV News broadcast separate bulletins to Northern Scotland (including an opt-out for the Tayside area), Glasgow & West Central Scotland, and Edinburgh & East Central Scotland. There is no STV South as Southern Scotland is part of the Border Television region (Border being owned by ITV plc) and programmes are presented there under the ITV Border brand.
Emphasising the fact that STV is essentially one channel across the two regions, there is now a single director of channels (Bobby Hain - former managing director of Scottish Television), and a single head of news (Gordon MacMillan - former head of news of Scottish TV). Terms in the renewed licences for both STV Central and STV North also mean that regional non-news programmes are shared (and identically scheduled) across both licences.
Although the stations are only required to produce 1.5 hours a week of regional non-news programmes (a single arrangement covering both North and Central regions), the chief executive of STV Group plc, Rob Woodward, told MPs at a Westminster briefing in October 2008 that the station would aim to increase its regional output from 2009 onwards.
Alongside daily regional news coverage, regular STV programming includes the nightly current affairs programme Scotland Tonight and rugby highlights programme STV Rugby. The company also produces many Gaelic programmes, some of which are now produced for the Scots Gaelic-language channel, BBC Alba, alongside archive material including Speaking our Language and Machair. On a network scale, one of STV's most famous exports is the long-running crime drama Taggart, set in Glasgow.
The network's range of programmes was dramatically expanded during the 1990s under director Alistair Moffat. Previous TV programming includes the serial dramas Take the High Road, Garnock Way & High Living, gameshows Now You See It and Wheel of Fortune, crime series Crimedesk with Bill Knox, long-running documentary series Weir's Way, lifestyle show Room at the Top, and Glen Michael's Cartoon Cavalcade, which lasted 26 years. Another of the station's best-known programmes, Scotsport, ran continuously for 51 years until May 2008 and remains one of the world's longest-running television sports programmes.
Read more about this topic: STV (TV Network)
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