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ITV’s Regional news programmes provide communities with high quality coverage of local news, events and sport as well as delivering a local perspective on stories of national and international significance.

In September 2007 ITV announced that it would achieve £40million of annual savings in its regional news services, taking effect in early 2009.

Following an extensive consultation process conducted by ITV, Ofcom’s Public Service Broadcasting Review approved the restructure in January 2009. Following this approval, ITV introduced a new framework of nine main news regions in England and Wales, with a number of dedicated local opt-outs (seven minute sections covering the local area aired within the news programme).

Read about some of the key regional news stories aired in 2009

Supporting young regional news journalists

All our regional newsrooms offer internships to people without journalism training who otherwise would not have the opportunity to get involved in television news.

ITV Local relaunch

In 2009, we relaunched ITV Local, our website which features the latest news for each region provided by our local news teams. The service allows people to keep up-to-date with the news in their local area at the click of a mouse.

Far From Home

Programmes across ITV1 joined forces to broadcast Far From Home, a series of features about British troops in Afghanistan, in the week leading up to Christmas 2009.

ITV regional and national news programmes, This Morning and GMTV aired features showing the reality of life on the frontline at Christmas and screened video messages home from the troops. We also invited families to ITV studios across the UK to reconnect with loved ones at Camp Bastion by live satellite link.

We broadcast two special programmes in support of British troops:

• A Night for Heroes, showcasing The Sun newspaper’s Military Awards for 2009 which reward the bravery of the armed forces
• Christmas Carols with the Troops, an hour-long special hosted by Trevor McDonald that featured a prayer for the troops, festive carols and messages for soldiers stationed in Helmand Province.

Our website, www.itv.com and the ITV YouTube channel played a central role in extending the reach of Far From Home. We made video messages from over 250 troops available online, far more than we could broadcast on television. The messages received 27,000 views on one week, and we extended the service for several days to meet demand.