BONGS ARE BACK IN TOWN

0 Comments | Sunday Mirror, Jan 6, 2008 | by MARK AUSTIN

GREAT excitement at ITN as we prepare for the scrap of our professional lives... we're going head to head with the mighty BBC.

As you no doubt know by now, News at Ten returns this month to its rightful slot in the ITV schedule on January 14.

Since it went, of course, the BBC have moved their main news bulletin to 10pm - so the competition, already fairly intense, will now be fiercer than ever. Michael Grade said when he took the top job at ITV that moving News at Ten had been a great mistake. He's right. As a young foreign correspondent, I travelled the world for that programme and was proud to do so.

A programme born in black-and-white in the era of typewriters and film is now being reborn in the era of suitcase satellites and instant live coverage.

The test will be the journalism and whether you want to watch. It's a big challenge for us, but we're more than ready.