Timeline of ITV

1950s

1954

The Television Act 1954 paves the way for the launch of commercial television in the UK and the first franchises are awarded by the newly formed Independent Television Authority.

1955

22 September – ITV is launched when the first contractor, Associated-Rediffusion, goes on air, broadcasting to London.

24 September - Associated Television (ATV London) launches as the London weekend contractor.

1956

17 February - Associated Television (ATV Midlands) launches ITV in the Midlands and the following day the Midlands’ weekend contractor Associated Television (ATV Midlands) broadcasts for the first time.

3 May - Granada Television launches ITV in the north of England and two days later the north of England’s weekend contractor Associated British Corporation (ABC), broadcasts for the first time.

1957

The first ITV Schools programmes are broadcast.

31 August - ITV starts broadcasting in central Scotland - Scottish Television is the franchise holder.

1958

14 January - Television Wales and the West (TWW) starts broadcasting to South Wales and the West of England.

30 August - Southern Television launches.

1959

15 January - Tyne Tees Television launches.

27 October - Anglia Television launches.

31 October - ITV launches in Northern Ireland when Ulster Television starts broadcasting.

1960s

1960

9 December - The first edition of Coronation Street is broadcast.

1961

29 April 1961 - Westward Television launches.

1 September - Border Television launches.

30 September - Grampian Television launches.

1962

1 September - Channel Television launches.

4 September - The final part of the UK gets an ITV service when Wales (West and North) Television launches in West and North Wales as Teledu Cymru.

1963

7 January - The first edition of World in Action is broadcast.

1964

26 January - Wales (West and North) Television stops broadcasting after going bankrupt. It is replaced by TWW. However the Teledu Cymru on-air identity is retained.

1965

2 January - The first edition of World of Sport is broadcast.

1966

No events.

1967

3 July - News at Ten is launched as a 13-week trial of a nightly 30 minute bulletin. The programme is soon made a permanent feature of the schedules.

1968

4 March - TWW stops broadcasting five months before its contract was due to expire. The ITA provided an interim service called interim service until 20 May when the new contractor, Harlech Television, took over.

29 July - Yorkshire Television launches following the decision to split the north region into two resulting in a new franchise for the Yorkshire area.

30 July - Thames Television replaces Associated-Rediffusion as the holder of the London weekday franchise although Redivision retains a 49% stake in the new company. London Weekend Television replaces ATV as London’s weekend franchisee.

ATV starts broadcasting to the Midlands seven days a week and Granada starts broadcasting across the north west seven days a week. In both cases ABC loses the right to broadcast.

The TV Times is launched as a national magazine to provide listings for ITV.

August - A technicians strike forces ITV off the air for several weeks although management manage to launch a temporary ITV Emergency National Service with no regional variations.

1969

15 November - ITV starts broadcasting in colour although it wasn't until 1976 that colour was available across the entire ITV network.

1970s

1970

23 November - The first edition of Engineering Announcements is broadcast.

1971

No events.

1972

12 July - The Independent Broadcasting Authority (IBA) replaces the Independent Television Authority.

16 October - Following a law change, ITV is able to launch an afternoon service. As part of this new service the first edition of Emmerdale Farm is broadcast and ITV's first lunchtime news programme, First Report is shown. ITV Schools transfers to a new morning slot.

1973

No events.

1974

The 1974 franchise round sees no changes in contractors. However the Belmont transmitter in Lincolnshire switched from Anglia Television to Yorkshire Television and the Bilsdale UHF transmitter, based on the border between Yorkshire Television and Tyne Tees Television and much disputed over, was assigned to Tyne Tees Television.

1975

No events.

1976

6 September - News at One replaces First Report and the teatime news bulletin programme is extended by five minutes and renamed News at 5.45.

1977

28 March - Yorkshire Television and Tyne Tees Television begin a nine-week trial of breakfast television.

1978

ITV's teletext service ORACLE launches.

1979

10 August - A ten-week strike forces ITV off the air. The only programme shown is the weekly edition of Engineering Announcements. The strike ends on 24 October.

1980s

1980

28 December - The ITA announces the new contractors to commence on 1 January 1982. The Midlands region will be split into two and dual regions will be created for Wales and the West and the South and South East. ATV is re-awarded its contract for the Midlands although there are several conditions including more regional content and increased production facilities in the Midlands. It is also told to rename itself and chooses the name Central Independent Television. Southern Television lost its licence for the South of England, in favour of Television South (TVS) and Westward Television also lost its licence for South West England, being replaced by Television South West (TSW) and a new breakfast television service will be launched with TV-am given the contract.

1981

11 August - TSW takes over Westward Television but continues to use the Westward Television name until 1 January 1982.

31 December - ATV, Southern Television and Westward Television stop broadcasting at the end of their day’s programming - i.e. shortly after midnight.

1982

1 January - Central Independent Television, TVS and TSW start broadcasting. Also the Bluebell Hill transmitter in Kent was transferred from Thames Television/LWT to TVS, to increase the size of TVS's new South East sub-region.

1983

3 January - Children's ITV is launched as a nationally broadcast weekday afternoon block of children's programming.

1 February - ITV’s breakfast television service TV-am launches. It is beaten to air by the BBC which launched Breakfast Time two weeks previously.

17 May - Engineering Announcements is broadcast on ITV for the final time. The programme transferred to Channel 4 and continued until 1990.

1984

16 October - The Bill launches as a regular programme, a year after a one-off episode was shown.

1985

3 January - The last day of transmission using the 405 lines system.

28 September - The final edition of World of Sport is broadcast.

1986

2 April - The first in-vision teletext service is seen on ITV when Central launches its Jobfinder service which broadcasts for one hour after the end of the day's programming. Jobfinder is launched in many other regions later on in the 1980s.

9 August - Yorkshire Television launches an experimental overnight service, simulcasting Music Box. The experiment ends at the start of 1987. Yorkshire would restart 24-hour broadcasting at the end of May 1988.

1987

Many of the larger ITV companies start broadcasting into the night and in August Anglia and Thames/LWT become the first stations to begin 24-hour broadcasting.

29 June - Schools programmes are broadcast on ITV for the last time. They are transferred to Channel 4 from the following autumn.

20 July - The lunchtime news programme moves to a 12.30pm slot and is renamed accordingly.

7 September - The transfer of ITV Schools to Channel 4 means that ITV is able to launch a full morning programme schedule, with advertising, for the first time. The new service includes regular five-minute national and regional news bulletins.

1988

15 February - An early morning 60-minute news programme - ITN Early Morning News - is launched but is only available in areas which have 24-hour broadcasting. The first 30 minutes of the programme included a full broadcast of ITN's international news bulletin ITN World News. In addition, brief news summaries are broadcast at various points through the night. This launch coincides with three of the major ITV companies - Scottish, Central and Granada Television - beginning 24-hour transmission.

May - The first ITV Telethon takes place over the spring bank holiday weekend. Two more Telethons were broadcast, in 1990 and 1992.

Summer - TVS and Channel (20 June), HTV (22 August) and Tyne Tees, TSW, Grampian and Border (2 September) begin 24-hour broadcasting.

3 October - All of the ITV companies are now broadcasting 24 hours a day following Ulster TV beginning round-the-clock transmission. On the same day the first edition of This Morning is broadcast.

1989

13 February - For the first time ITV starts broadcasting a national weather forecast. Previously each company had aired its own regional weather forecast which they had broadcast at the end of their local news programmes and at closedown.

1 September - ITV introduces its first official logo as part of an attempt to unify the network under one image whilst retaining regional identity.

1990s

1990

No events.

1991

1 January - The Independent Television Commission (ITC) replaces the IBA.

March - Following the conclusion of the Gulf War, the ITN Early Morning News is halved in length and now goes on air at 5.30. From this point, the ITN World News is no longer broadcast as part of the bulletin.

November - The (ITC) announces the results of the franchise round. Following the Broadcasting Act 1990, the ITC had to conduct a franchise auction whereby contracts would be given to the highest bidder, subject to fulfilling a programming ‘quality threshold.’ TSW lost the South West of England franchise to Westcountry Television, Thames Television lost the London weekday franchise to Carlton Television, TVS lost the South of England franchise to Meridian Broadcasting, TV-am lost the national breakfast television franchise to Sunrise Television, which changed its name to GMTV before launch because of a dispute with British Sky Broadcasting over the name 'Sunrise' and ORACLE lost the National Teletext franchise to Teletext Ltd.

1992

2 March - The News at 5.40 is renamed ITN Early Evening News.

June - Yorkshire and Tyne Tees television merger beginning a process that would see the consolidation of ITV over the next decade.

1 November – The satellite TV channel UK Gold, run by the BBC with Thames Television, starts broadcasting. Thames gets involved with this service ahead of it losing its ITV franchise.

31 December - TV-am, Thames Television, TVS and TSW broadcast for the final time, ending transmission at just before midnight.

1993

1 January - GMTV, Carlton Television, Meridian Broadcasting and Westcountry Television start broadcasting. Also Teletext launches as ITV’s new teletext service.

28 June - The final ITV Schools broadcasts take place.

1994

Granada Television buys LWT, Carlton Television takes over Central Independent Television

1995

No events.

1996

Carlton Television buys Westcountry Television and increased its stake in Central Independent Television to 81%.

1 September - Carlton Food Network launches.

1 October - Granada Sky Broadcasting, in conjunction with BSkyB, launches four channels - Granada Plus, Granada Good Life, Granada Men & Motors and Granada Talk TV

1 November - A joint venture between Scottish Television and BSkyB results in the launch of Sky Scottish.

1997

More consolidation takes place. Granada Television acquires Yorkshire-Tyne Tees Television, Scottish Media Group (SMG), which owned Scottish Television, acquires Grampian Television and United News and Media, the owner of Meridian Broadcasting and Anglia Television, purchased HTV.

February - Carlton Select is launched. It replaces SelecTV, which it acquired when Carlton bought Pearson Television.

25 June - The ITC awards the sole DTT broadcast licence to British Digital Broadcasting.

31 August - Granada Talk TV stops broadcasting.

1998

ITV Nightscreen is shown for the first time.

1 May - Granada Good Life is renamed Granada Breeze.

31 May - Sky Scottish stops broadcasting.

29 July - BDB rebrands as ONdigital.

15 November – Public launch of digital terrestrial TV in the UK with the launch of OnDigital and as part of the 19-channel line-up, three new channels for Carlton start broadcasting - Carlton Cinema, Carlton Kids and Carlton World

7 December - ITV2 is launched, but only in England and Wales. Also World in Action is broadcast for the final time.

1999

5 March - ITV News at Ten is broadcast for the final time.

8 March - Major changes to ITV's news programmes take place today, including different times for the channel's news programmes and the programmes were referred to as ITV News rather than ITN News. The main bulletin of the day is now considered to be the Early Evening News and is moved from 5.40pm to 6.30pm and the evening news is controversially pushed back to 11pm although the following year the ITC forces ITV to move the late evening news back to 10pm on three nights each week. Also ITV's lunchtime news bulletin is relaunched as ITV Lunchtime News.

30 April - Scottish Television launches S2.

28 June - Ulster Television launches TV You (later UTV2)

6 September - Carlton Television drops the Central Independent Television and Westcountry Television names from their on-air presentation, instead branding these regions as Carlton Television, and using the same presentation for all three regions.

8 November - a new, hearts-based on-air look is introduced

2000s

2000

United News and Media sells its three stations - Meridian, HTV and Anglia - to Granada Television.

1 February - Carlton World stops broadcasting.

1 March - Carlton Select stops broadcasting.

3 June - Carlton Kids stops broadcasting.

1 August - The ITN News Channel launches.

2001

Carlton Food Network is renamed Taste CFN.

July - Granada buys Border Television.

11 July - ITV relaunches OnDigital as ITV Digital Ltd

27 July - S2 closes and ITV2 starts broadcasting in Scotland.

11 August - ITV Sport Channel launches and ITV is renamed ITV1.

1 December - Taste CFN stops broadcasting.

2002

22 January - UTV2 stops broadcasting and ITV2 launches in Northern Ireland.

March - ITV Digital goes into administration.

30 April - Granada Breeze stops broadcasting.

1 May - ITV Digital stops broadcasting.

12 May - ITV Sports Channel stops broadcasting.

30 September - ITN News Channel is renamed ITV News Channel.

28 October - Regional identities are dropped apart from when introducing regional programmes.

2003

31 March - Carlton Cinema stops broadcasting.

29 December - Ofcom replaces the ITC.

2004

January - Carlton and Granada merge to create a single England and Wales ITV company called ITV plc.

2 February - After several years of inconsistent scheduling of the late evening news, the bulletin moves to a five nights a week 10.30pm start time.

1 November - ITV3 launches, replacing Plus which closes a few hours prior to ITV3's launch. Earlier that day ITV bought out BSkyB's stake in Granada Sky Broadcasting.

2005

11 February - The ITV Lunchtime News is extended to last 60 minutes.

1 November - ITV4 launches, but only as a part-time channel.

23 December - ITV News Channel stops broadcasting at 6pm.

2006

11 March - CITV Channel launches.

19 April - ITV Play launches.

30 May - STV launches across Scotland replacing the previously separate services of Scottish and Grampian.

4 September - The ITV Lunchtime News reverts to being a 30-minute programme and its start time is moved back to 1.30pm.

30 October - ITV2, and ITV3 launch +1 channels.

2007

15 March - ITV Play closes down.

September - Major cost-cutting plans were announced which would see massive cutbacks to regional programming, including the reduction of regional news programmes from seventeen to nine. The changes took affect in February 2009.

2008

14 January - ITV News at Ten returns to the schedules on four nights each week - the Friday edition remains at 11pm.

5 February - ITV4 becomes a 24-hour channel.

17 July - ITV HD launches as a full-time service. A trial broadcast had taken place during summer 2006.

1 December - ITV4 +1 launches.

2009

November - ITV takes full control of GMTV.

2010s

2010

1 April - Men & Motors stops broadcasting.

21 June - ITV’s teletext service stops broadcasting.

31 August - Final episode of The Bill is shown.

3 September - The final edition of GMTV is broadcast.

6 September - The first edition of Daybreak is broadcast.

7 October - ITV2 HD launches.

15 November - ITV3 HD and ITV4 HD launch.

2011

11 January - ITV +1 is launched.

2012

21 December - The final edition of ITV's early morning news programme ITV News at 5:30 is broadcast. Consequently, there is no longer any overnight news coverage on ITV.

2013

14 January - After more than 11 years, the ITV1 brand is dropped and the main channel is known once again as ITV.

2014

25 April - The final edition of Daybreak is broadcast.

28 April - The first edition of Good Morning Britain is broadcast.

9 June - ITV Encore launches.

8 October - ITVBe launches.

2015

1 January - UTV Ireland launches in the Republic of Ireland.

2016

29 March - ITV buys UTV.

17 October - UTV is rebranded to match ITV's current look.

2017

1 January - UTV Ireland closes and is replaced by be3.

4 February - ITV launches a pay-per-view service called ITV Box Office. The channel's first event is a boxing match between Chris Eubank Jr. and Renold Quinlan.