1988 in British television

Updated on Dec 18, 2024

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This is a list of British television related events from 1988.

January

4 January – BBC1 moves the repeat episode of Neighbours to a 5:35pm evening slot, the decision to do this having been made by controller Michael Grade on the advice of his daughter.

6 January – All ITV regions network Emmerdale Farm in the Wednesday and Thursday 6.30pm slot.

11 January – The first episode of the game show Fifteen to One airs on Channel 4. The show's first winner is Gareth McMullan, a teacher from Northern Ireland.

25–29 January – TV-am airs a week of live broadcasts from Sydney to celebrate Australia's bicentenary.

February

5 February – The inaugural Red Nose Day sees Comic Relief air its first A Night of Comic Relief fundraiser on BBC1.

13–28 February – The 1988 Winter Olympics are held in Calgary, Alberta and broadcast to television audiences around the world.

15 February – Red Dwarf makes its debut on BBC2.

20 February – London's Burning makes its debut as a regular series on ITV, having been developed from Jack Rosenthal's original 1986 film.

March

19 March – Two off-duty British soldiers are killed after stumbling into an IRA funeral procession in Belfast. Footage of the incident is captured by journalists and widely broadcast.

22 March – Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher tells the House of Commons that journalists have a "bounden duty" to assist the police investigation into the corporals killings by handing over their footage. Many have refused to do so fearing it could place them in danger.

23 March – Film of the corporals killings is seized from the BBC and ITN under the Prevention of Terrorism and Emergency Provisions Acts.

April

4 April – The original series of Crossroads airs for the last time on ITV. It returns in 2001 before being axed again in 2003.

6 April – ITV's chart show The Roxy airs for the last time.

15 April – The Pogues perform their controversial hit Streets of Sorrow/Birmingham Six – a song expressing support for those convicted over the Guildford and Birmingham pub bombings – on the Ben Elton Channel 4 show Friday Night Live. The song is cut short, however, by a commercial break.

28 April – ITV broadcasts Death on the Rock, a hugely controversial episode of Thames Television's This Week current affairs strand, investigating Operation Flavius, which resulted in the SAS killing three members of the IRA in Gibraltar on 6 March.

May

9 May – The youth strand DEF II is launched on BBC2.

19 May – Anita Dobson makes her last appearance in EastEnders, when her character, Angie Watts departs for a new life in Spain.

23 May – Three gay rights activists invade the BBC studios during a Six O'Clock bulletin of the BBC News to protest about the introduction of Section 28, a law preventing schools from teaching their students about homosexuality. Protesters can be heard chanting as Sue Lawley continues to read the news, prompting the presenter to comment "we have been rather invaded by some people who we hope to be removing very shortly".

29–30 May – ITV stages the first Telethon, a 27-hour nationwide fundraising effort involving participation and input from all of the regional broadcasters around the country. Its aim is to raise money for disability charities across the United Kingdom.

31 May – Debut of Charles Wood's screenplay Tumbledown about the experiences of Scots Guard Robert Lawrence, who was left paralysed after being shot in the head by a sniper at the Battle of Mount Tumbledown during the Falklands War.

June

8 June –

Television presenter Russell Harty dies aged 53.

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch announces to the British Academy of Film and Television Arts his intention to launch a new news service. Sky News is launched at 6.00pm on 5 February 1989.

11 June – The Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute concert is staged at Wembley Stadium, London, and broadcast to 67 countries and an audience of 600 million. In the UK it was broadcast on BBC 2.

21 June – BBC 1 airs Crystal Clear, a film based on the award-winning play of the same name that deals with the subject of sight loss.

July

1 July – Australian series The Flying Doctors makes its British television debut on BBC 1. Initially aired on Fridays at 8.10pm, from 20 August, it is moved to a Saturday early evening slot.

19 July – The Bill broadcasts the first episode of its fourth season and switches to a year-round serial format.

26 July – Anna Wing makes her final appearance as EastEnders matriarch Lou Beale, dispensing words of wisdom and advice to her family before retiring to her bedroom to slip away. Her final words in the soap are: "That's you lot sorted. I can go now." The character has died by the following episode, and at her funeral, her on-screen son Pete (played by Peter Dean) proposes a toast to that "bloody old bag". Wing herself died, aged 98, in 2013.

August

3 August – Brookside is moved from Tuesdays to Wednesdays which means the soap can now be seen on Mondays and Wednesdays.

31 August – ITV airs a version of The Hound of the Baskervilles starring Jeremy Brett and Edward Hardwicke.

September

7 September – Repeat showing of Paul Hamann's death row documentary Fourteen Days in May, telling the story of the final days of Edward Earl Johnson as he awaits execution on Mississippi's death row. The film is followed on 14 September by The Journey, in which lawyer Clive Stafford Smith returns to Mississippi in an attempt to posthumously clear Johnson of the crimes to which he always professed his innocence.

8 September – Channel 4 drops plans to invite Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams to appear on an edition of its late night discussion programme After Dark following objections from other contributors.

9 September – Casualty returns to BBC1 for a third series, moving from its previous Saturday evening slot to Friday evenings.

12 September – Debut of Stoppit and Tidyup, a 13-part series narrated by Terry Wogan, and partly funded by the Tidy Britain Group charity.

17 September–2 October – The 1988 Summer Olympics are held in Seoul, South Korea and broadcast to television audiences around the world.

18 September – Debut of the BBC political discussion programme On the Record, presented by Jonathan Dimbleby.

20 September – Death, at the age of 54, of actor Roy Kinnear, who the previous day had fallen from a horse during the making of The Return of the Musketeers in Toledo, Spain. He sustained a broken pelvis and internal bleeding, and was taken to hospital in Madrid, where he died from a heart attack, brought on by his injuries.

30 September – Television presenters Mike Smith and Sarah Greene are seriously injured in a helicopter crash in Gloucestershire.

October

3 October –

The magazine programme This Morning makes its debut. It is presented by Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan until 2001.

Ulster Television in Northern Ireland is the last in the ITV network to begin 24-hour transmission.

The Oprah Winfrey Show makes its British television debut on Channel 4.

5 October – ITV begins airing the Australian soap Richmond Hill in a 2.00pm slot on Wednesdays and Thursdays, the first time the channel has networked an Australian soap. However, some regions (including Central and Granada) opt out of networking the series when it is cancelled by Australia's Channel Ten in 1989.

19 October – Home Secretary Douglas Hurd issues a notice under clause 13(4) of the BBC Licence and Agreement to the BBC and under section 29(3) of the Broadcasting Act 1981 to the Independent Broadcasting Authority prohibiting the broadcast of direct statements by representatives or supporters of 11 Irish political and military organisations. The ban lasts until 1994, and denies the UK news media the right to broadcast the voices, though not the words, of all Irish republican and Loyalist paramilitaries. The restrictions – targeted primarily at Sinn Féin – means that actors are used to speak the words of any representative interviewed for radio and television.

25 October – As the 25th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy approaches ITV airs the two-part documentary The Men Who Killed Kennedy, a film which explores discrepancies and inconsistencies in the US Government's official version of events.

November

2 November –

In the House of Commons, an amendment introduced by the opposition Labour Party condemning the government's decision over the broadcasting ban as "incompatible with a free society" is rejected, despite some Conservative MPs voting with Labour.

Evacuation, an episode of ITV's The Bill features one of the series early prominent events – an explosion at Sun Hill police station.

8 November – BBC1 airs Episode 523 of Neighbours, featuring the wedding of Scott Robinson and Charlene Mitchell (played by Jason Donovan and Kylie Minogue), which is watched by 20 million viewers.

13 November–18 December – The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, one of C.S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia, is aired as a six-part TV serial by the BBC, featuring actors including Ronald Pickup, Barbara Kellerman and Michael Aldridge.

23 November – The BBC science fiction series Doctor Who celebrates its 25th anniversary and begins the three-part serial Silver Nemesis.

24 November – Frank Ruse, a left-wing Labour councillor for Liverpool City Council accompanies Liverpool's Pagoda Chinese Youth Orchestra to London for an appearance on Blue Peter. He is given a Blue Peter badge, but later receives a BBC headed letter requesting its return. The letter (later discovered to be a forgery) claims the programme had been approached by the office of Labour leader Neil Kinnock expressing concern that a councillor with hard-left views had been given a Blue Peter badge. Upon receiving the returned badge, the BBC writes back to Ruse stating that it had not sent the letter. The incident prompts Ruse to start an enquiry to find out who sent the hoax letter.

26 November – Tugs, a children's model animated series made by Clearwater Features (the company behind the first two seasons of Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends) debuts on ITV.

December

1 December – ITV's ORACLE Teletext service launches Park Avenue, a teletext based soap opera. It is written by Robert Burns and runs until ORACLE loses its franchise at the end of 1992.

3 December – Comedian Steve Tandy wins New Faces of '88.

11 December – Launch date of the Astra Satellite. The satellite will provide television coverage to Western Europe and is revolutionary as one of the first medium-powered satellites, allowing reception with smaller dishes than has previously been possible.

13 December – Central airs the final episode of Sons and Daughters making it the first ITV region to complete the series.

22 December – Singer Neneh Cherry performs her single "Buffalo Stance" on Top of the Pops while seven months pregnant, something that goes on to cause a furore in the media.

25 December –

The final edition of It's a Knockout to air on BBC1 is another celebrity special, It's a Charity Knockout From Walt Disney World, featuring teams of celebrities from the United Kingdom, United States and Australia. The series returns to S4C in 1991.

"Ding Dong Merrily", the London's Burning Christmas special, and the only episode of the series to have a title, is broadcast by ITV as part of its Christmas Day line up.

26 December – BBC1 airs CivvyStreet, a spin-off episode of EastEnders set during World War II.

26–30 December – As part of a Christmas special, Channel 4 soap Brookside airs five episodes over five consecutive days.

BBC1

3 January – First of the Summer Wine (1988–1989)

3 May – 4 Square (1988–1991)

30 May – Tumbledown

3 September – Noel's Saturday Roadshow (1988–1990)

12 September – Stoppit and Tidyup (1988)

18 September – On the Record (1988–2002)

17 October – Playdays (1988–1997)

20 October – * Charlie Chalk (1987–1989)

29 December – You Rang, M'Lord? (1988–1993)

BBC2

15 February – Red Dwarf (1988–1999, 2012–present)

9 May – DEF II (1988–1994)

18 October – Colin's Sandwich (1988–1990)

ITV

4 January – After Henry (1988–1992)

20 February –

You Bet! (1988–1997)

London's Burning (1988–2002)

16 April – All Clued Up (1988–1991)

19 July – Wheel of Fortune (1988–2001)

26 July – I Can Do That (1988–1991)

3 September – The Hit Man and Her (1988–1992)

6 September – Count Duckula (1988–1993)

3 October – This Morning (1988—present)

24 November – Children's Ward (1988–2000)

26 November – TUGS (1988–1989)

1 December – Park Avenue on ORACLE (1988–1992)

3 December – How to Be Cool (1988)

Channel 4

11 January – Fifteen to One (1988–2003, 2013–present)

23 September – Whose Line Is It Anyway? (1988–1998)

1940s

Come Dancing (1949–1998)

1950s

Panorama (1953–present)

Opportunity Knocks (1956–1978, 1987–1990)

This Week (1956–1978, 1986–1992)

What the Papers Say (1956–2008)

The Sky at Night (1957–present)

Blue Peter (1958–present)

Grandstand (1958–2007)

1960s

Coronation Street (1960–present)

Songs of Praise (1961–present)

Doctor Who (1963–1989, 2005–present)

World in Action (1963–1998)

Top of the Pops (1964–2006)

Match of the Day (1964–present)

Mr. and Mrs. (1964–1999, 2008–2010, 2012–present)

Jackanory (1965–1996, 2006–present)

Sportsnight (1965–1997)

Call My Bluff (1965–2005)

The Money Programme (1966–2010)

The Big Match (1968–2002)

1970s

Rainbow (1972–1992, 1994–1995)

Emmerdale (1972–present)

Newsround (1972–present)

Last of the Summer Wine (1973–2010)

That's Life! (1973–1994)

Wish You Were Here...? (1974–2003)

Arena (1975–present)

Jim'll Fix It (1975–1994)

One Man and His Dog (1976–present)

Grange Hill (1978–2008)

The Book Tower (1979–1989)

Blankety Blank (1979–1990, 1997–2002)

The Paul Daniels Magic Show (1979–1994)

Antiques Roadshow (1979–present)

Question Time (1979–present)

1980s

Children in Need (1980–present)

Bergerac (1981–1991)

'Allo 'Allo! (1982–1992)

Wogan (1981–1992)

Brookside (1982–2003)

Countdown (1982–present)

Timewatch (1982–present)

Right to Reply (1982–2001)

Breakfast Time (1983–1989)

Dramarama (1983–1989)

Don't Wait Up (1983–1990)

Aspel & Company (1984–1993)

Good Morning Britain (1983–1992, 2014–present)

First Tuesday (1983–1993)

Highway (1983–1993)

Blockbusters (1983–93, 1994–95, 1997, 2000–01, 2012–present)

Ever Decreasing Circles (1984–1989)

Wide Awake Club (1984–1992)

Bob's Full House (1984–1990)

Spitting Image (1984–1996)

The Bill (1984–2010)

Channel 4 Racing (1984–2016)

Three Up, Two Down (1985–1989)

Home to Roost (1985–1990)

Howards' Way (1985–1990)

Busman's Holiday (1985–1993)

EastEnders (1985–present)

The Cook Report (1985–1998)

Crosswits (1985–1998)

Telly Addicts (1985–1998)

Comic Relief (1985–present)

Bread (1986–1991)

Brush Strokes (1986–1991)

Naked Video (1986–1991)

Boon (1986–1992, 1995)

Every Second Counts (1986–1993)

Lovejoy (1986–1994)

Beadle's About (1986–1996)

The Chart Show (1986–1998, 2008–2009)

Casualty (1986–present)

Allsorts (1987–1995)

Going Live! (1987–1993)

Watching (1987–1993)

The Time, The Place (1987–1996)

Going for Gold (1987–1996, 2008–2009)

Chain Letters (1987–1997)

ChuckleVision (1987–2009)

Ending this year

2 January

No. 73 (1982–1988)

Weekend World (1972–1988)

Let's Pretend (1982–1988)

Bad Boyes (1987–1988)

13 January – Your Mother Wouldn't Like It (1985–1988)

28 January – Yes Minister (1980–1988)

30 January – Hi-De-Hi (1980–1988)

11 March – Play School (1964–1988)

18 March – Rockliffe's Babies (1987–1988)

4 April – Crossroads (1964–1988, 2001–2003)

6 April – The Roxy (1987–1988)

17 April – Hot Metal (1986–1988)

13 May – Tales of the Unexpected (1979–1988)

30 May – All in Good Faith (1985–1988)

26 August – Child's Play (1984–1988)

28 August – Get Fresh (1986–1988)

10 October – Sorry! (1981–1982, 1985–1988)

23 October – Network 7 (1987–1988)

27 October – Beat the Teacher (1984–1988)

1 December – Button Moon (1980–1988)

3 December – New Faces (1973–1978, 1986–1988)

5 December – Stoppit and Tidyup (1988)

17 December – How to Be Cool (1988)

24 December – 3-2-1 (1978–1988)

27 December – Executive Stress (1986–1988)

Births

14 January – Jack P. Shepherd, actor

22 March – Gaz Beadle, TV personality

28 March – Lacey Turner, actress

2 December – Alfred Enoch, actor

References

1988 in British television Wikipedia

(Text) CC BY-SA

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