Global National

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Global National
The 2006 opening of Global National
Genre	News
Starring	Kevin Newman
Country of origin	Canada
Language(s)	English
No. of episodes	N/A
Production
Running time	30 mins.
Broadcast
Original channel	Global
Original run	2001 – present
Links
Official website

Global National is the national newscast of Global Television Network in Canada. It broadcasts daily from facilities at Global's Vancouver station CHAN.

The program's weekday anchor is Kevin Newman, whose name was added to the program's title beginning in its second season.

Global National aired for the first time on September 3, 2001. Prior to its launch, Global aired Canada Tonight (which it had inherited from the WIC group of stations) for a few months; that program, in turn, had replaced regional newscasts such as First National.

The show aired only on weekdays until February 26, 2005, when Saturday and Sunday editions were launched with Tara Nelson as weekend anchor. Nelson also serves as substitute for Newman.

Regular substitute anchors include Robin Stickley (Global BC), Leslie Roberts (Global Ontario), Jill Krop (Global BC), Deborra Hope (Global BC), Chris Gailus (Global BC), and former Global BC anchors Suzette Myers, Reg Hampton and Sophie Lui (CH Victoria).

The program, covering national and international news, is aired live at 5:30 p.m. on Global stations in the Eastern Time Zone and 6:30 p.m. in the Atlantic Time Zone. This version of the show is then broadcast via satellite tape delay in time zones to the west (at 5:30 local time), with updates if news events warrant. The timeslot allows it to become a lead-in to local news in most of the country. While already strong in Western Canada (particularly in B.C., where the Global station CHAN (formerly BCTV) has historically been a news powerhouse), it may now be better able to break through in Ontario, where CIII's local 5:30 newscast had long been buoyed by its lead-in, The Young and the Restless.

Until February 2006, Global National aired in different time slots across the country: 5:30 in British Columbia, 6:00 in Manitoba and Saskatchewan, 6:30 in Alberta, Ontario and Quebec, and 11:15 in the Maritime Provinces.

Despite having fewer reporters and being a latecomer to national news in Canada, Global National has come to rival its competitors at CTV National News and CBC's The National in both awards and ratings. During most weeks since the timeslot change in February, Global National has ranked as Canada's most-watched national newscast according to the Bureau of Broadcast Measurement. This is with the caveat that only initial airings from Monday to Friday are compared; CTV still leads on a seven-day basis [1].

[edit] Unique Offerings

Global National is the first mainstream Canadian newscast to be released as a podcast. In 2006 the download was expanded to include video for playback on a video iPod.

Global National often uses VoxPolls using text messaging to conduct informal polls, the results are shown on the newscast and in The National Post.