ITV bosses ‘enrage staff’ with lavish 70th anniversary parties

This September it is seventy years since the original regional Independent Television network in London launched…

ITV top executives have reportedly angered staff by planning lavish anniversary parties, to mark 70 years of broadcasting, amid major budget cuts and job losses particularly in the daytime division.

The Daily Mail reports an invite was issued to ITV Studios staff; “Celebrate our 70th in style… Enjoy delicious food and drinks, Instagram worthy photo opportunities and DJs.” However the newspaper suggests it wasn’t the happy sound of balloons being blown across the studios’ offices from the invite with the planned celebrations deemed more of an insult due to recently announced cut-backs.

Cost cutting will affect prime time and daytime slots with serials Coronation Street and Emmerdale being cut back in output from January 2026 while in daytime Good Morning Britian is to relocate to ITN who produced the network ITV News offering as well as the local London news programmes. This will see the closure of the GMB newsroom and reporters, the first time since 1992 when TV-am was winding down and handed its news service over to Sky News. Prior to that brief period, the ITV breakfast franchise, has always had its own dedicated separate news team since the original Good Morning Britain’s launch in February 1983.

First on Air: Associated Rediffusion was the first ITV station on air in September 1955

The move to merge GMB into ITN is part of a wider review by ITV of its daytime scheduling and production to find cost savings and efficiencies. ITN’s unique shared infrastructure model enables this consolidation of ITV’s news operations.

Alongside the GMB editorial team moving over, all aspects of the production will also come from Gray’s Inn Road.  This includes the creation of a new newsroom and production facilities, and ITV News’ main studio will be transformed to become the combined home of Good Morning Britain, national and international programming in ITV News and regional service ITV News London. In addition, ITN will build a new backstage area, including dressing rooms, wardrobe, make-up and a green room. Reporters and some behind the scenes staff have been told they will have to reapply for their jobs once the show moves to ITN.

Lorraine, hosted by Lorraine Kelly, will be cut to a half-hour slot and only air for 30 weeks of the year. Loose Women is to also be cut back to 30 weeks a year and also lose its studio audience. Other savings will see these programmes along with This Morning relocate to a Covent Garden studio facility recently purchased by ITV. The three separate production teams will be merged into one once the productions leave Televison Centre in December. 220 of the 440 staff involved will lose their jobs.

With all that going on a source told the Daily Mail, that “no-one feels like celebrating right now” and that the events have been described as “inappropriate” and in “really bad taste”.

“The feeling among staff is that the channel throwing a party is in really bad taste given hundreds of people are losing their jobs… The event will no doubt cost a large amount of money, and many believe that bosses should put those funds towards tying to limit redundancies…”

Second night: ATV London (as ABC for the first few weeks) launched in London. In 1956 ATV Midlands also joined the ITV network.

ITV bosses are planning three 70th anniversary parties, one in London where the station launched in 1955 and also in Leeds, which remains a major production centre thanks to Emmerdale and in Salford where Coronation Street and several other programmes are produced.

Speaking to The Evening Standard a spokesperson for ITV said:

“As ITV marks its 70th anniversary this September we are holding staff events in London, Manchester and Leeds to which all staff at ITV have been invited. We’re taking this opportunity to thank everyone for their efforts and commitment in continuing to produce award-winning, impactful and entertaining programmes.

“We are of course mindful of the impact the proposed changes to our Daytime productions in 2026 will have on some of our staff and we are working hard to support them.”

Summer Granada TV logo 1989

The current ITV was established in 2003 when the two main companies who owned the ‘regional stations’ that made up the ITV Network merged. This saw Carlton Broadcasting and Granada Television create the ‘one ITV’ national channel with the exception of UTV in Northern Ireland, Channel Television for the Channel Islands and STV in Scotland. Over the years UTV and CTV also were swallowed up by the corporate giant, leaving STV the last independent on the independent network. The operation ‘ITVplc‘ is led by the bigger shareholder Granada.

The first stations on air in 1955 were Associated Rediffusion, which broadcast to London on weekdays, and ATV London (initially as ABC London) which transmitted on Saturday and Sundays. The first night’s output was a co-production between the two companies.

The rest of the ITV network went on air over a number of years following the launch in the capital. Of those regions only a handful have remained ‘active’ throughout, all be it diminished into producing local news only (and occasional specials or political offerings) for the past fifteen years. These include Tyne Tees in the North East (1959), Anglia Television for East of England (1959), Granada for the North West (1956), CTV for the Channel Islands (1962) and UTV for Northern Island (1956). The remaining independent STV launched in 1957.