ITV Tyne Tees, previously known as Tyne Tees, Channel 3 North East and Tyne Tees Television, is the ITV television franchisee for North East England and parts of North Yorkshire.
Tyne Tees launched on 15 January 1959 from studios at a converted warehouse in City Road, Newcastle upon Tyne, remaining in the city until July 2005 when Tyne Tees moved to smaller studios in Gateshead. Tyne Tees has contributed various programming to the ITV network and Channel 4, as well as its regional output. Some of Tyne Tees' best known programming includes the groundbreaking music show The Tube, critically acclaimed adaptations of Catherine Cookson novels, and children's programmes such as Super Gran.
The ownership and management structure of Tyne Tees has altered across its history, particularly in various mergers with Yorkshire Television. The two stations were managed by Trident Television during the 1970s, and the two stations merged again in 1992 to form Yorkshire-Tyne Tees Television. A series of takeovers and mergers across the ITV network, instigated by the large franchisees Granada and Carlton, led to Tyne Tees becoming part of ITV plc in 2004. The licence is currently held by ITV Broadcasting Ltd and the original Tyne Tees Television Ltd was dissolved on 28 March 2017.
The analogue signals in the Tyne Tees region were switched off in 2012, making the station, along with ITV London and UTV, one of the last ITV regions to become digital-only.
History
Launch and the 1960s Independent television was introduced to Britain in September 1955. Initially only available in the London region, commercial television steadily became available in other regions. After a financially difficult time for the first ITV companies, the Independent Television Authority (ITA) decided to offer independent television to the rest of the country and advertised for bids. Several offers were submitted, including from the existing four companies, to the ITA. North East England was the last of the English regions without a television transmitter. Sir Richard Pease headed a local consortium that included film producer Sydney Box and News Chronicle executives George and Alfred Black. This consortium, was chosen from among eleven applicants because of its strong local links, commitment to local programming, concentrating on regional topical matters, and educational and children's programmes. The contract was awarded on 12 December 1957. Experienced television executive Anthony Jelly was appointed as managing director, although historian Andrew Spicer credits the Black brothers as the driving force and public face of Tyne Tees; George was programme director, and both brothers were prominent board members. The company opened its first Newcastle office at Bradburn House on Northumberland Street, and it was from there, on 3 January 1958, the company directors issued 300,000 ordinary shares at fours shillings each.
Tyne Tees is named after two of the region's three primary rivers. ITA considered the original name, "North East England", was imprecise. Some of the consortium's suggestions were rejected: "Three Rivers Television" for being obscure, and "Tyne, Wear, and Tees" for being too long. Eventually, in October 1958, the name "Tyne Tees" was announced. The other major river, the Wear (which runs between the Tyne and the Tees), was represented within Tyne Tees' early signature tune "Three Rivers Fantasy".
The BBC transmitted their programmes from the Pontop Pike transmitting station in County Durham. The ITA built a new transmitter nearby at Burnhope, to cover an area from Alnwick to Northallerton, and west to Middleton-in-Teesdale. Television sets required a new aerial, the Yagi array, to receive the high frequency that the transmitter was using.
Tyne Tees went on air at 5 p.m. on 15 January 1959, three years after the first British independent television station, and the tenth such station to launch. The then-prime minister Harold Macmillan, who had been the Member of Parliament (MP) for the nearby Stockton-on-Tees for two decades, was interviewed live on the opening night. This was followed by a live variety show, named The Big Show, broadcast from a small studio. However, this local content was followed by an episode of the American police series Highway Patrol and an evening of entertainment programmes including I Love Lucy and Double Your Money. The full first night's programming was
17:00 Three Rivers Fantasy – opened by the Duke of Northumberland. 17:15 The Adventures of Robin Hood 17:40 Popeye 17:55 ITN News 18:05 North-East News 18:15 The Prime Minister greets the people in the North-East, with interviews from Adrian Cairns and hosted by Bill Lyon-Shaw 18:25 Strange Experiences, narrated by Peter Williams 18:30 Highway Patrol 19:00 The Big Show, starring Dickie Henderson 20:00 Double Your Money, starring Hugh Green 20:30 This Week 21:00 Wagon Train 22:00 ITN News 22:15 Murder Bag 22:45 Sports Desk, introduced by George Taylor 22:55 I Love Lucy 23:25 Epilogue read by the Bishop of Durham, performed by the North Seaton Colliery Brass Band, and sung by several choruses
In the 2006 documentary A History of Tyneside, veteran North East newsreader Mike Neville suggested that the launch of Tyne Tees enabled local people to be able to hear local accents and dialects on television, since early broadcasters, particularly those from the BBC, tended to speak in Received Pronunciation. Scholar Natasha Vall suggests that the station's commitment to broadcasting comedy helped establish a regional identity. George and Alfred Black had toured working men's clubs looking for material for television. Local comic Bobby Thompson was invited to host a solo show. However, poor ratings and an unenthusiastic cast led to the show's cancellation after barely a year.
Where most independent television companies published their schedules in the magazine TVTimes, Tyne Tees produced their own listings magazine. The Viewer was published by News Chronicle, a company with connections to the station through the Black brothers. It was produced to satisfy " 'Tyne Tees' policy to be most regional of all the independent stations". Initially produced from an office in Forth Lane, near Newcastle station, it moved to the City Road studios when Dickens Press took over publication in 1963. The magazine became the biggest selling magazine in the region, with a circulation of 300,000 per week. New contracts issued by the ITA in 1968 stipulated that all ITV companies publish their listings in the TV Times, which became a national magazine with regional variations for the listings. After 498 editions, the last issues of The Viewer was published in September 1968.
The first advertisement screened on Tyne Tees was for Welch's Toffee. The proprietor's niece is Denise, who would become a well-known actress and personality. In 1959, Tyne Tees charged advertisers £100 for 15 seconds during prime time. The station launched a marketing campaign in the 1960s to sell advertising time named 'Through Plan'. One of the range of promotional material was a poster called 'Sweet Sixteen', featuring photographs of 15 men accompanied by their full names, job titles and other formal history. The sole woman was simply referred to by her first name and her measurements. Historian Geoff Phillips comments that this "was a profound statement of the culture of the time". Tyne Tees produced Advertising Magazines (admags), programmes with a loose storyline designed to advertise several products within an edition. Each 15-minute programme had about 12 product endorsements. Clients sat in the control room during rehearsals to ensure that their products were getting the exposure for which they had paid.
A committee was established in 1960 under the leadership of British industrialist Sir Harry Pilkington to consider the future of broadcasting. The 1962 Pilkington Report criticised ITV, and Tyne Tees in particular. Some companies, historian Simon Cherry notes, were scrambling "very readily for the lowest common denominator ... Tyne Tees was notorious for avoiding minority programmes and putting out cop shows or westerns instead."
1970s
Following his report, Pilkington prompted the government to impose a levy on ITV's revenue, the effects of which were heightened by a recession in 1970 when revenue had declined by 12 percent in real terms. Despite a reduction of the levy, Tyne Tees was one of the contractors facing collapse. To ensure Tyne Tees' survival, the ITA allowed it to affiliate with Yorkshire Television under a joint management company named 'Trident Television'. The third 'prong' of Trident was intended to be Anglia Television, but the IBA ruled out their involvement. Trident Television was formed in March 1969 as a joint venture to sell advertisements for Tyne Tees and Yorkshire. Yorkshire and Tyne Tees then came under Trident's ownership on 1 January 1974. Peter Stanley Paine, Director of the broadcaster's holding company Trident, was appointed managing director of Tyne Tees Television in 1974.
For the first time, one company owned two distinct and separate ITV franchises although the new company was dominated by the larger, stronger Yorkshire whose shareholders owned 71.5 percent of the new company. Trident had sales offices in London, where most agencies are located and where most advertising is bought and sold.
A major factor in the merger was that when UHF transmission was introduced in 1969 to accommodate colour television it was found that the key Bilsdale transmitting station in North Yorkshire so dominated the territories of both companies that its allotment to either individual company would have seriously prejudiced the coverage and sales revenue of the other. The ITA agreed that Tyne Tees and Yorkshire could be considered as one company for the purposes of selling airtime, while expressing their individual identities in their programming output.
A political scandal caused problems during one of Tyne Tees' franchise renewals. Producer Tony Sandford recalls that Lord Pilkington was sent by the ITA to question the station's executives. One-time leader of Newcastle City Council T. Dan Smith had been convicted for accepting bribes concerning the redevelopment of Newcastle city centre. Pointing out that Smith became a director of the station, Pilkington asked why Tyne Tees failed to produce a documentary about a Newcastle politician, instead leaving it to Manchester-based Granada's current affairs programme World in Action. By the late seventies, Tyne-Tees's locally made programming amounted to an average of less than nine hours a week, with the remainder of programming from the ITV network. In 1978, The Economist reported that a group called Northumbria Television, partially financed by local firms Bellway Holding and Swan Hunter, applied to the IBA to take over the franchise from the "tired" Tyne Tees for the two and a half years until the scheduled franchise renewal in 1981.
1980s
Yorkshire and Tyne Tees applied separately for renewal of the franchises in 1980, and each won. However, the two companies were required to demerge from January 1982 as a condition of the renewal of their ITV franchises. The Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA), the successor to the ITA, recognised the criticism, reported The Economist, "that Trident was London-dominated, overly diversified, and out of touch with the grass roots. It instructed Trident to set up both companies as independents and to retain only a minority shareholding in each." The IBA imposed the condition that for the 1980 franchise round a company could only own one franchise, although it could earn up to 30 percent of another. By November 1981, Trident had sold all but residual stakes in the two companies (15% and 20% respectively). When the new licences started in January 1982, Trident sold all but 30 percent of Yorkshire, and 25 percent of Tyne Tees.