''Sixty Minutes'' is a news and current affairs programme which ran each weekday at 5:40 pm from 24 October 1983 to 27 July 1984 on

BBC1 BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, ...

. It replaced '' Nationwide'', and integrated the BBC's main regional news magazines into a single programme, as per its predecessor. However, the BBC's News department stoutly maintained its independence from their colleagues in Current Affairs, and the first 15 minutes of news was almost a separate entity, followed by around 20 minutes of regional news before the final 25 minutes of national current affairs. Accordingly, the format was unwieldy, with neither the conciseness of a bulletin nor the soft approach of the show's predecessor, ''Nationwide''. The editor, David Lloyd, poached Nick Ross from the highly popular '' Breakfast Time'' to front the show, along with Desmond Wilcox,

Sarah Kennedy Sarah Mary Kennedy MBE (born 8 July 1950) is a British retired TV and radio broadcaster. She presented her daily early morning radio show, ''The Dawn Patrol'', on BBC Radio 2 from 1993 to 2010. In the 2005 Queen's Birthday Honours, Kennedy ...

, and Sally Magnusson. Kennedy was unable to join the team at the programme's launch, but eventually began to present ''Sixty Minutes'' after Wilcox was dismissed, just seven weeks into the show's run. The news bulletins were usually broadcast from a separate studio at BBC Television Centre and presented by either Jan Leeming, Moira Stuart or

Richard Whitmore Richard Whitmore (born 22 December 1933 in Hitchin, Hertfordshire) is a broadcaster, writer and actor. Whitmore is best known for his work as a BBC newsreader in the 1970s and 1980s and occasional work as a reporter. He was educated at the form ...

. The opening titles were designed by Terry Hylton and produced by the Computer Film Company. As with its predecessor ''Nationwide'', ''Sixty Minutes'' was also responsible for the evening regional news output for London and the South East. Whereas all the other BBC regions had their own dedicated news bulletins, ''Sixty Minutes'' presenters would read the latest news for London and the South East, simply titled "South East".http://www.tv-ark.org.uk/mivana/mediaplayer.php?id=8ef8b25fa3fabb1713d924cd26264dfa&media=bbc60minutessoutheast1984&type=mp4 The programme was not well received, and although its ratings eventually began to improve, the final edition aired on Friday 27 July 1984. Throughout August, BBC1 reverted to placing the '' BBC Evening News'' at 5.40 pm followed by the regional news magazines, before launching a new schedule on 3 September 1984 with the '' Six O'clock News''; that programme remains in place as of 2022. Arguably, another legacy of ''Sixty Minutes'' was the eventual integration of the

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broadc ...

and Current Affairs departments.

References

1983 British television series debuts 1984 British television series endings BBC television news shows English-language television shows {{BBC-tv-prog-stub

See also

References