DIGITAL VIEWERS TO RECEIVE BBC REGIONAL NEWS

DIRECTOR-General Greg Dyke has announced that Digital Satellite viewers across England are to receive their regional news services on BBC One for the first time.
Two-thirds of the country will get this service early in the New Year and the remaining regions as soon as possible thereafter.
Speaking at a seminar in Birmingham to members of the BBC’s advisory councils from across England, Dyke said: “We firmly believe in the digital future and will do whatever we sensibly can to invest in it, to add to viewers’ choice. By using the innovative interactive technology used so successfully for Wimbledon and the Open Golf this summer we can now provide these new regional services.”
The first phase, covering more than 70 per cent of the population, will apply to viewers in the London area, the North West (broadcast from Manchester), the North region (broadcast from Leeds), the West Midlands (broadcast from Birmingham) and the South (broadcast from Southampton).
The BBC hopes to launch the rest of the English Regions local news programmes on satellite soon.
Until then digital satellite viewers outside these five regions will have to switch back to analogue TV in order to watch them.
Viewers will select the regional programme of their choice from a menu of five alternatives.
The changes also mean that the current service carried in regional news slots on BBC One in digital satellite homes, UK Today, will no longer be needed and come to an end in January.
The changes will benefit an estimated 4.2 million homes in England that currently have digital satellite. (CD)