Central Tonight

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Central Tonight

Genre	News
Created by	ITV Central
Starring	West Midlands: Bob Warman Anna Brees Joanne Malin East Midlands: Steve Clamp Sameena Ali-Khan Louisa James
Country of origin	United Kingdom
Production
Running time	Central Tonight: 30 Minutes Central News for the East and West Midlands: Varies
Broadcast
Original channel	ITV1 Central
Original run	(as Central Tonight) July 24, 2006 – present

Central Tonight is the main news programme on ITV Central. Since Monday 24 July 2006, the regular 6pm programme has been entitled Central Tonight, replacing the old name of Central News to come in line with other ITV regional news programmes with "Tonight" at the end.

Central News went on air on 1 January 1982, replacing the previous programme ATV Today broadcast by Central's predecessor company ATV.

The programme has two versions which are identically branded - one covering the East Midlands and one for the West Midlands.

Until 1 December 2006, there was a version of the programme for the south of the region (which remained Central News at Six), but this has now ended with most of this part of the region becoming part of the ITV Thames Valley region along with the northern part of ITV Meridian.

1 Central News West
2 Central News East
3 Future
4 Central News South (Now Defunct)
5 Central Weather
6 On Air
7 References
8 External links

[edit] Central News West

Central News West is the regional news programme for the West Midlands, broadcast from ITV Central's headquarters in Gas Street, Birmingham. The area served by the West Midlands programme is the counties of Staffordshire, West Midlands, Herefordshire, Shropshire, Warwickshire and Worcestershire.

The West Midlands edition at 6pm is presented by Bob Warman, and Joanne Malin. Llewella Bailey formerly co-presented the East Midlands edition of Central News at Six alongside Marie Ashby before moving back to present the main 6pm West Midlands edition for a while in the 2000s; she now presents the weekend bulletins and can still be seen presenting Central Tonight periodically.

West Midlands reporters and presenters include:

Keith Wilkinson (has also been seen on Central News South)
Steve Keeling
Eric MacInnes (previously with ITN and Central News South)
Sandy Barton
Arti Halai (current breakfast and lunchtime presenter)
Yvonne Gaskill (current breakfast and lunchtime presenter)
Annette Finch (Stand in Sports Presenter/reporter)
Anna Brees (regular late bulletin presenter)
Karen Griggs (regular Central Tonight presenter)
Kirsten Hills (regular late bulletin presenter)
Bob Hall (sport reporter/presenter)
Mark Gough (reporter and stand in presenter for Central Tonight)
Linda O'Brien (sport reporter/presenter)
Gareth Owen (reporter/presenter)
Andy Bevan (reporter and Head of News

Herefordshire re-joined the Central News West programme in December 2006 with a live broadcast from Hereford Cathedral. This began a week-long series of reports focusing on the major highlights of the county.

[edit] Central News East

The East Midlands sub-region was launched on 12 October 1983 from a temporary studio at Giltbrook near Nottingham. The original intent had been to launch on 1 January 1982, but problems with the then-powerful broadcasting unions prevented its launch for nearly two years. The programme had a short life at Giltbrook and the programme was moved to Central's brand new studio on Lenton Lane, Nottingham, from 3 January 1984. The programme was moved to Central's studios at Gas Street, Birmingham after the studios in Nottingham were shut in 2004 as a result of a restructuring programme across the ITV Network.

The ITV Central headquarters in Birmingham Gas Street.

News gathering is still based in Nottingham at Terry Lloyd House which opened in February 2005. Terry Lloyd House is named after the former Central News reporter Terry Lloyd, who was killed in Iraq whilst covering the Iraq war for ITV/ITN in 2003.

This edition covers the East Midlands counties of Derbyshire, Rutland, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, northern Northamptonshire and southern parts of Lincolnshire.

Previous presenters of the 6pm edition in the 2000s included Marie Ashby, Llewella Bailey, Dominic Heale, Kevin Ashford and Jonathan Ray.

Currently the main presenters are Sameena Ali-Khan and Steve Clamp. Louisa James is the late bulletin presenter.

East Midlands reporters include:

Lucy Kite
Rajiv Popat
Bharat Patel
Gareth Owen
Helen Finch
Dennis Coath (sports reporter/presenter)

[edit] Future

The future of Central Tonight in its current format is in doubt. In June 2007, ITV plc executive chairman Michael Grade hinted at a possible re-structure of the ITV regional layout. Central Tonight West and East Midlands editions could merge into one programme with small opt-outs for each region during the programme.^[1]. The move is expected to give ITV plc "greater value for money", but may be subject to Ofcom approval^[2]. The East Midlands edition of Central Tonight is expected to be axed in autumn 2008.

The newly created ITV Thames Valley region made up of the majority of the former Central News South region, would merge with Meridian Tonight to create a 'super region' in the south of England. This would span as far West as Dorset and Wiltshire and as far East as Kent and East Sussex.

[edit] Central News South (Now Defunct)

Central News South transmission area: Herefordshire, Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire, parts of Buckinghamshire.

Central News South is the now defunct version of the programme which was first aired on 9 January 1989 with Wesley Smith & Anne Dawson and with special guest Eddie 'The Eagle' Edwards. The first edition is well remembered for being dogged completely with technical problems. Unlike Central West & East, Central South was based at, and broadcast from studios in Abingdon, Oxfordshire.

Presenters and reporters included:

Wesley Smith (Now with Thames Valley Tonight)
Hannah Shellswell (nee Stewart-Jones) (Now with Thames Valley Tonight)
Alex Forrest (Now with Central News West and occasionally ITV News)
Gillian Kelly (Now with Thames Valley Tonight)
Mike Rowbottom (ex IRN, TVS and Dubai TV, now a university lecturer)
Simon Garrett (Ex Yorkshire TV, now a freelance consultant and producer)
Graeme Bowd (Ex Daily Express, TVS, now a freelance film maker)
Richard Barnett
Martin Graham Scott (Dcsd, went on to ITN)
Claire Holt (nee Taylor)
Claire Lafferty
Kim Barnes (Ex Tyne Tees, now BBC)
Erika Barnes (ex BBC)
Tim Hurst
Gareth Furby
Geoff Barrett
Chris Moore
Sally Mules (Now with Thames Valley Tonight)
Ken Goodwin (Now with The West Tonight)
Richard Franklin (Now with The West Tonight)
Christopher Peacock (Previously with Southern's Day by Day, TVS's Coast to Coast & London Tonight. Followed on with Thames Valley Tonight before leaving to run his own media business in London.)
Mark Lipscomb (Now a freelance Weekend presenter on Thames Valley Tonight)
Victoria Bennett (Now with Thames Valley Tonight)
Anna Brees (Now with Central News West)
Jonathan Wilats (Now with Central News West)
Kirsten Hills (Now with Central News West)
Victoria Bryning (Now a freelance presenter on Sky News)
Tim Russon
Jan Onoszko (Now with The West Tonight and occasionally seen on Central News West.)
Andy Bevan (Now with Central News West as the Head of News and sometimes Reporter.)
Kate Garraway (Now with GMTV, via Meridian West)
Anne Dawson (Now a Broadcast Journalism lecturer at University of Gloucestershire)
Geraldine Peers (Now with BBC Oxford News, the South Today opt-out for Oxfordshire and surrounding areas)
Enda Brady (Now with Sky News)
Harriet Ryley
Ama Boeting
Tom Parmenter (Previously with Central News West and now with Sky News)
Robin Powell (Now with Sky News)
Alec Wilkinson (Now with Sky News and presenter of sailing coverage on Sky Sports)

It was announced on 6 June 2006 that Central News South was to end after 17 years, be broken up and merge with other ITV news regions. Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire & Swindon would merge with the existing Meridian North region to form a new ITV Thames Valley service (with its 6pm news programme to be named Thames Valley Tonight). Gloucestershire was to become part of the ITV West (formally HTV West) region broadcast from Bristol. Herefordshire was to rejoin Central News West from Birmingham. The last regional bulletin was on Sunday 3 December 2006, and the last "Central News"-branded pan-regional service was aired during GMTV on Monday 4 December.

[edit] Central Weather

The weather updates are presented by:

Emma Jesson West Midlands
Charlie Neil West Midlands
Lisa Foden East Midlands
Anna Church East Midlands
James Wright (occasionally)

In 2007, Central News for the East Midlands ran a 'Weather Idol' contest, which was won by Anna Church and she, along with long serving reporter Lisa Foden became the weather presenters for the East Midlands, while Emma Jesson and Charlie Neil now only present for the West Midlands.

[edit] On Air

Central News airs on ITV1 Central seven days a week. ITV Central provides three news bulletins during GMTV. The mid-morning bulletin airs immediately broadcasts after an ITV News Summary, during This Morning, this update airs for around 10 minutes. The lunchtime edition of the programme follows on from the ITV Lunchtime News, giving a five minute round-up of the days developments between 1.55pm and 2.00pm. The main evening edition of Central Tonight begins at 6.00pm, and ends at 6.30pm. The late news update from the region follows the News at Ten, airing between 10.25pm and 10.35pm, Mondays to Thursdays, and between 11.25pm and 11.35pm on Fridays, after The Late News.

Central News airs four bulletins at weekends: two on Saturday, at lunchtime, and late afternoon, and two on Sunday: at lunchtime and the evening edition at 6.25pm. These bulletins are pan-regional and cover both the East and West Midlands.