ITV Yorkshire
ITV Yorkshire, previously known as Yorkshire Television and commonly referred to as just YTV, is the British television service provided by ITV Broadcasting Limited for the Yorkshire franchise area on the ITV network. Until 1974, this was primarily the historic county of Yorkshire and parts of neighbouring counties served by the Emley Moor transmitter. Following a reorganisation in 1974 the transmission area was extended to include Lincolnshire, northwestern Norfolk and parts of Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire, served by the Belmont transmitter.
Two consortia applied for the franchise, Telefusion Yorkshire Ltd and Yorkshire Independent Television, the former having large financial backing and the latter having the better plans but fewer resources.
On 1 January 2007, the company transferred its programme production business to ITV Studios Limited. As a consequence, Yorkshire Television Limited ceased to trade on 1 January 2007. Yorkshire Television Ltd still legally exists, but its licence is now owned and operated by ITV plc under the licence name of ITV Broadcasting Limited. Yorkshire Television Ltd is, along with most other regional companies owned by ITV plc, listed with Companies House as a dormant company.
History
ITV Yorkshire, previously known as Yorkshire Television, and sometimes abbreviated to YTV or Yorkshire, has its origins in the 1967 franchise round. That round stipulated that the influential pan-North region, the licence which was owned by Granada Television and ABC, both based in Manchester, had to be split up. Consequently, it was decided that Granada would keep the North West franchise and a new franchise created for Yorkshire.On 28 February 1967, national and regional newspapers carried numerous advertisements from the Independent Television Authority, each requesting applicants for various new ITV contracts, one of which was Programme Contractor for Yorkshire Area – All Week. Ten formal bids were received by the closing date; another less-serious bid, Diddy TV, headed by comedian Ken Dodd withdrew their application.
Telefusion Yorkshire Limited, created by the Blackpool-based TV rental chain Telefusion and led by Grampian TV Managing Director G. E. Ward Thomas, was selected as the winning bid. It was chosen on the condition that it 'merged' with another applicant Yorkshire Independent Television. The latter, backed by a consortium of Yorkshire Post Newspapers Ltd, other local newspaper groups such as the Huddersfield Examiner and the Scarborough Evening News, several Yorkshire-based Co-operative societies, trade unions and local universities, was deemed by the Authority to have the better talent but suffered a lack of funding, whereas Telefusion had the backing of a cash-rich parent. The new venture initially chose the name Yorkshire Television Network but decided to drop the word 'Network' before going on air. A few days after winning, the chairman Sir Richard Graham said: "We see ourselves as having a particular responsibility to convey to a mature audience the particular qualities and strengths of one of the most populous and most important areas outside London."
The station began broadcasting on 29 July 1968 from new studios at Kirkstall Road in Leeds. Although they were purpose-built for colour production and equipped with £2.2 million of equipment, the majority of initial broadcasts were in monochrome until the ITV network formally launched its colour output on 15 November 1969. After an opening ceremony led by The Duchess of Kent, the station's first programme was live coverage of the Test cricket match between England and Australia at Headingley. Other programmes broadcast on YTV's opening day included the first edition of its regional news programme Calendar, the station's first networked production – the 'Playhouse' drama Daddy Kiss it Better – and a light entertainment special, First Night, hosted by Bob Monkhouse.
The station was hit hard financially when the transmitter mast at Emley Moor collapsed in March 1969 under a heavy build-up of ice. This left the major part of the region uncovered by Yorkshire Television plus BBC2 who broadcast from the same mast. A temporary mast was quickly erected and television to the West Riding of Yorkshire resumed, albeit with reduced coverage. From this, the company grew and by May 1970 the company was making profits of over £689,000. After a series of temporary masts at Emley Moor, the current 275 metre reinforced concrete tower — topped by a 55-metre steel lattice mast — began transmitting in 1971, resuming full area coverage for the YTV region.
In June 1969, talks began between Yorkshire and Anglia about achieving a cost-cutting exercise by sharing equipment and facilities. Neither company planned joint productions or a merger. The decision to form an association was purely down to the costs of the increased levy on the companies' advertising revenue by the government, and the cost of colour TV. The ITA stated there was no reason why the companies should not have talks about sensible economies that could be made, but would examine all details before any association were to be implemented. In January 1970, a warning was given that regionalism would be abandoned and a forced merger with Anglia Television would happen unless the chancellor reduced the levy applied on advertising revenues, which was also not helped by the high cost with colour television and the introduction of UHF, which the government agreed to a few months later.
With the introduction of UHF broadcasting, YTV had failed to gain the Bilsdale transmitter in North Yorkshire, which was allocated instead to Tyne Tees Television due to the transmitter's penetration into Teesside and County Durham. This seriously reduced YTV's monopoly commercial broadcast area. Partially to address this issue, in 1974 the Independent Broadcasting Authority reallocated the Belmont Transmitter, then served by Anglia Television, to YTV. Although the area served by Belmont was largely rural, it did cover the more industrial centres of Hull, Grimsby, Scunthorpe and Lincoln and it was felt the region would be better served from Leeds rather than from Norwich.
Trident Television
In August 1970, following a reverse takeover, Yorkshire Television was effectively merged with its neighbour Tyne Tees Television, when the two were brought under the control of Trident Television Limited, a company formed to deal with the problem of effective ownership of the Bilsdale transmitter and the allocation of airtime. It is often contended that the other point of the trident was intended to be Anglia Television, but they were prevented from joining by the Independent Broadcasting Authority. However, it appears that the third 'point' was to be Trident's non-television interests and that Anglia were never considered as partners in the enterprise.The two stations remained separately run and were required to demerge by late 1981 as a condition of the re-awarding of their ITV contracts from January 1982. Trident's majority shareholdings were sold although they retained ownership of studios and equipment which were leased to the respective companies.
On 28 March 1977, Yorkshire launched a breakfast television experiment. Good Morning Calendar is credited as being the UK's first breakfast television programme, six years before the launch of the BBC's Breakfast Time. The programme ran concurrently with a similar Tyne Tees programme, Good Morning North for North East viewers. Both series ended after nine weeks on 27 May 1977.
1970s: Industrial relations
From its inception, YTV had a turbulent relationship with the broadcasting unions. Many employees at the new company were recruited from the Manchester and Birmingham studios of the former ABC Weekend Television and the London station Rediffusion; the upheaval of enforced job changes on these employees combined with a relatively new management of a new ITV station and huge investment by shareholders provided fertile ground for the unions.In 1971, technicians broadcast a handwritten note that read "'Yorkshire Television have threatened to sack us. We are going on strike. Goodnight." six minutes before the end of "Kate". A black screen appeared before that evening's News at Ten was broadcast. The dispute was involving ACTT union members who had refused to work overtime due to pay rates.
YTV was forced off the air by more industrial action over the whole of Christmas, 1978. This partially coincided with a two-day national shutdown of both BBC channels by strikes in December of that year, meaning that for those two days viewers in the region had no television at all. Many of ITV's Christmas programmes were eventually shown in the Yorkshire region in early 1979, after the dispute had ended.
In the ITV strike of 1979, the station, like the rest of the network, was off the air for over two months. However, the dispute was more intense at YTV as the company's management were seen as instrumental in fighting the unions, especially Paul Fox, the Managing Director, and Ward Thomas, the Chairman of Trident Television.
In the 1980 franchise round, several YTV staff submitted their own application for the Yorkshire franchise under the name of 'Television Yorkshire'. They were backed by Donald Baverstock and Jonathan Aitken, MP, who believed they would provide a better service. Yorkshire retained the franchise with the addition of number of relay transmitters on the Lancashire/Yorkshire border, covering Todmorden and Walsden, which were transferred from the Granada region.
1980s/later broadcasting years
On 9 August 1986, Yorkshire Television became the first ITV company and the first British terrestrial television station to offer 24-hour broadcasting. This was achieved by simulcasting the satellite station Music Box for a three-month trial, as permitted by the IBA. The all-night simulcasts continued until Friday 2 January 1987 – shortly before Music Box ceased operations as a broadcaster. Thereafter, Yorkshire ran a teletext-based Jobfinder service for one hour after closedown with a Through Till Three strand on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights introduced a few months later. 24-hour broadcasting resumed on 29 May 1988.In 1982, after the split up of Trident Television, Bass acquired a 20.93% share in Yorkshire TV. In July 1987, Bass sold the stake since it no longer fitted in with its operations. The managing director of YTV said: "We are very sorry to lose Bass as a shareholder; they have been very supportive to Yorkshire Television." By the end of the year, YTV profits had increased to £13.94 million, and it had become one of the largest suppliers of programmes to Channel 4. In October 1987, the production unit had received a co-production pact with Telecom Entertainment in order to co-produce and develop projects, that involved international stars and British crew, around the world and it involved co-productions and projects that came from the deal included the rights to four M. M. Kaye novels for her Death In book series, as well as The Attic: The Hiding of Anne Frank, for CBS and ITV.
In March 1988, Paul Fox left the company to join the BBC, after spending 15 years as Yorkshire managing director. A month later, Paul Mckess resigned. A member of staff said "It comes as a surprise to us, but we don't think there had been a row or anything like that". Clive Leach became managing director.
In preparation of the new ITV franchises, the company started to cut costs which resulted in 91 voluntary redundancies; this had a minor effect with slightly fewer programmes being produced.