08-02-2023, 10:55 PM
(08-02-2023, 07:57 PM)ginnyfan Wrote: In a way, it is a sad switch going from news channel to network bulletins full time. I know network is more prestigious, more watched, better payed etc but you just don't get the same type of challenges (breaking news, rolling coverage, interviews and debates) over there. It's basic newsreading with very little to do outside of that, at least during a bulletin.I do wonder if this is the last the News channels will see of them and whether there is a bit of administrative legal fiction to the shift from column A to column B. I mean, from 2006 to 2020, Huw was the senior network presenter while still appearing on the News channel for the News at Five. With the margins of available presenters on the news channel looking to a bit thin, I wouldn't be surprised if they turn up as relief presenters - plus, of course, they'll still appear as lead presenters across both network and the News channel on big stories like Ukraine.
(08-02-2023, 10:23 PM)Radio_man Wrote: I fail to see how there still won't be a 5pm UK news hour though?Focus on Africa won't go out in the UK (unless, perhaps, there was a really big Africa story), but during the Ukraine crisis they showed that they could have World presenters continue in the UK (and I think some World regions) while Focus on Africa went on as normal elsewhere. I suspect you'll have that set-up on the new channel, particulary with Focus coming from Nairobi.
I can't see any circumstance where Focus on Africa will go out on the UK stream at 5:30pm, and it's hardly appropriate to have a back half hour filler program on at 5:30pm for UK viewers.
So why can't the current arrangement of the 1pm news presenter and gallery team also doing the 5pm hour on the UK stream continue?
It'd be good to get some UK-only content at some point of the day, but it appears that (at least for now) that isn't the path they're going down. A visualised PM programme has been suggested in the past for the 17:00 hour, but I think the issue with a News at Five hour is more the gallery teams and studio space rather than presenters.