Tuesday 9 February 2010

Regional news - a confused picture

The GMG decision to sell the Manchester Evening news stable to Trinity Mirror is clearly an important development in the ever-changing landscape of the UK's provincial press.   However, from a broadcast news perspective,  it is the absence from the deal of Manchester television station Channel M which is particularly interesting.

As mentioned elsewhere on this blog, the Tory idea for securing plurality in regional television news is the creation of dozens of city-based services across the country akin to Channel M.   Trinity's decision not to buy the station may have been purely a strategic one.   However, if the station is not soon snapped up from a GMG which seems willing to sell, a question mark would surely hang over the viability of the services which are a key tranche of Tory broadcasting policy.   And maybe then Jeremy Hunt's vehement opposition to those ITV regional news pilots might seem a little out of step.

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