Following Ofcom’s green light, 15 out of 20 local TV channels owned by That’s TV will have local news produced from outside their region.
Two studios, one in Glasgow and one in Manchester will record links for the entire network, with local studio bases in Cambridge, Salisbury, Swansea and York axed. Production centres in Norwich, Reading and Swansea will support the studio bases. That’s TV is also withdrawing production from Edinburgh.
- In Northern England, the studio base in Manchester will deliver all local content across all of That’s TV’s local services. This now includes That’s TV’s channels in Grimsby, Scarborough and York
- In Eastern England, a production base in Norwich and studios in Manchester will support That’s TV local news service in Cambridge and Norwich.
- Across southern England, a central production centre in Reading will support services in locations including Guildford, Oxford Portsmouth and Salisbury.
- Swansea continues to have its own office. Links will be produced from studios in either Glasgow or Manchester.
- North of the border, all five Scottish services will be supplied by Glasgow.
A request to reduce production centres were first submitted by That’s TV boss Daniel Cass to Ofcom in May 2021. In it Mr Cass cited changes to the broadcaster’s operating model as a reason for the changes. Journalists will rely on video-conferencing tools, including Zoom to conduct interviews with people in the local areas.
Currently That’s TV carries a 10 minute local news bulletin at 6pm on its local Freeview channels. Local news repeats in a loop during the early hours of the morning. However, local information is also broadcast alongside music videos at certain other times of the day.
Availability
- That’s TV is available on Freeview channel 7 or 8 in 20 locations across the UK, depending on area. That’s TV Gold, a national version of the channel without local news is available on Freeview (in some areas), plus Sky and Freesat.