[Keith]

Just to nip it in the bud because I know it's a matter of minutes before somebody posts 'how can you run a news channel on five presenters' and we don't want to have the discussion for the fourteenth time...

The new channel will not have *just* five presenters. There will be five London-based presenters who have no other duties and are solely allocated to the channel. In addition to this there will be eight London-based presenter-reporters, i.e. those who also have editorial and/or reporting responsbilities (presumably as per Atkins and Hakim at present) and several Washington and Singapore-based presenters. As present, I expect that freelance and certain primarily BBC One presenters will also appear on the channel when needed and I presume that the mysteriously defined UK opt service would require at least one or two additional presenters.

Based on 5 presenters it feels like they might be aiming for UK shifts along the lines of...
- Weekdays 9am to 1pm
- Weekdays 1 to 5pm
- Weekends 9am to 1pm
- Weekends 1pm to 5pm

Presumably after 5pm it'll be a mix of Washington, Singapore, and possibly some presenter-reporters from London (assuming Outside Source and The Context remain).

As DTV mentioned hopefully the presenters for whatever UK opt-out we get won't come from this pool of five presenters. Arguably whoever presents the News at One could also present until 5pm for the UK, though as that network bulletin is no longer managed by the news channel this might not be practical.