Politics Now
| Politics Now | |
|---|---|
Politics Now titles
|
|
| Genre | Politics |
| Directed by | John Mason, Laura Trimble |
| Presented by | Bernard Ponsonby |
| Starring | David Torrance (reporter) |
| Theme music composer | Paul Leonard-Morgan |
| Country of origin | Scotland, United Kingdom |
| Original language(s) | English |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Gordon McMillan |
| Producer(s) | Stephen Townsend, Laura Baird (assistant) |
| Location(s) | Glasgow, Scotland |
| Cinematography | Colin Matheson, James McLaughlin |
| Running time | 30 min(2009-11) 45min(2004-09) |
| Production company(s) | STV News |
| Release | |
| Original network | STV |
| Original release | January 8, 2004 – 30 June 2011 |
| Chronology | |
| Preceded by |
Crossfire (1984-2004) Platform (1996-2004) The Week In Politics |
| Followed by |
Scotland Tonight (2011) |
| Related shows | STV News at Six |
| External links | |
| Website | |
Politics Now was a Scottish political programme produced and broadcast by STV in northern and central Scotland. The programme, broadcast for 40 weeks of the year, on a Thursday evenings after the late STV News bulletin, covered all of the big Political developments in Westminster, Brussels and Holyrood in detail.
The programme was presented by STV's political editor Bernard Ponsonby with features reports and contributions from the rest of STV's political unit - Westminster correspondent Harry Smith, political correspondent Jamie Livingstone and freelance reporter David Torrance. The programme was originally presented by former political correspondent Michael Crow until his departure from the station in January 2009.
The series was replaced in 2011 by Scotland Tonight, which broadcast Mondays to Thursdays on STV covering current affairs and politics.
Prior to the creation of Politics Now, the political programmes were:
In June 1997, Scottish Television acquired Grampian Television, and from 1999, it was decided to broadcast both series on Scottish and Grampian, with Platform covering the first six months of the year, with Crossfire covering rest of the year. STV believed this would ensure viewers in both the central belt and the north of Scotland being aware of the issues which affect each part of Scotland. In addition The Week in Politics, a weekly digest of the events of the Scottish Parliament which focuses on the work of the radical committee system in the Scottish Parliament, was introduced in 1999, to complement the two programmes.
Both achieved strong ratings, regularly attracting double the number of viewers of Newsnight Scotland.
During 2003, it became clear the Scottish political landscape had changed both fundamentally and dramatically. To better reflect the changes it was decided to overhaul the stations' political programming into a single flagship series broadcasting 40 weeks a year in a 45-minute slot, with production bases in Aberdeen, Glasgow and Edinburgh, and correspondents in London and Brussels. For 22 weeks of the year the programme came from Grampian TV's new studio in Aberdeen.
A Grampian TV spokesperson said "Our existing programmes, Crossfire and The Week in Politics have served us well and have given Grampian TV significant profile in the political community. However we believe we are now in a position to offer our viewers an even better service. Politics Now will be a brand new political programme."
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