Scotland Today

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Scotland Today

Genre	News
Starring	John Mackay (Main anchor)
Country of origin	Scotland
Production
Running time	Main bulletin: 30 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel	STV Central
Original run	1972 – Present

Scotland Today is the flagship news programme on STV, in Central Scotland. Despite its name suggesting a national remit, the programme is actually limited to stories around stv's Central Belt franchise. North Tonight covers stv's North Scotland region (from Fife upwards), with BBC Scotland providing a national service for Scotland, in the shape of Reporting Scotland.

Based in Glasgow, the programme has become a credible news programme from the days of flowers, sofas and features in the mid-eighties. It has covered stories such as the Dunblane massacre, the Lockerbie bombing and the Argyll priest scandal in the nineties.

The programme faced major changes as a result of mass redundancies both in the newsroom and technical support division. Presenters Shereen Nanjiani, Sarah Heaney and sports presenter Jane Lewis have all taken voluntary redundancy. Sarah left the programme in March, 2006. Jane followed her on April 24, 2006, with Shereen leaving on May 5, 2006. Quite a few reporters have also left the programme, they include Matt Bingham, Becky Hunter, Alan Saunby, Iona Scott and Roddy Scott.

On January 8, 2007 Scotland Today launched a split news services. Viewers in the west and the east of central Scotland each get a dedicated bulletin within the main Scotland Today reporting on what is happening in the communities. In the west, the programme covers from Tobermory to Falkirk. While the east Scotland Today reports from Anstruther to Dunbar. [1]