The Come Back Kid 

19 August 2009 tbs.pm/1089

More Mark Austin on News at Ten

As part of a piece proclaiming that Mark Austin will be doing more News at Ten, is the news that Alastair Stewart is to move to the ITV Evening News, and is to leave his role at London Tonight.

On the face of it, this is not the worlds most important media news story. But reading it, it struck me that it’s quite rare to see someone in television restored to their former crown.

Alastair Stewart was, of course, a key ITN anchor in the 1980s and 1990s before moving to London Tonight when the programme started in 1993.

For most presenters, it would be a move that you could never go back from. The most you’d probably get is a lift up onto a news channel – and indeed Stewart did present on the ITV News Channel.

But since then, his role back on the network news has slowly but surely increasing. Nicholas Owen’s departure to the BBC led to Stewart taking on the lunchtime news. And now he’s back in the early evening too.

ITV does have some fine news presenters. Now all it needs is some decent news programming to use them on…

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