BBC Scotland has announced it will launch two new current affairs shows in the New Year.
The news comes months after Ofcom granted approval for BBC Scotland to cut its peak-time TV news output in half.
In a statement issued in August, the media regulator said that the public broadcaster had asked for permission “to reduce the news quota on the BBC Scotland channel by 50% from the current 250 hours in peak time per calendar year to 125 hours”.
Ofcom said it had approved the change, which sees the flagship The Nine news programme axed entirely. The final show will air before Christmas.
In its place, a 30-minute weeknight show, Reporting Scotland: News at Seven, has been announced.
It is set to be presented by one presenter each night. Laura Maciver and Amy Irons are to share the days across the week.
The broadcaster said News at Seven will "complement Reporting Scotland on BBC One at 6.30pm, which will continue to be the programme that provides the primary coverage of Scotland’s national news".
Elsewhere, Martin Geissler (below) will front current affairs podcast series titles Scotcast.
It is said the show will "go behind the headlines, bringing insight, analysis, conversation and a bit of humour to the stories that audiences are talking about".
Gary Smith, head of news and current affairs, said: “2024 has been a busy year for news and current affairs in Scotland – with a UK election, the Euros, and a change of First Minister from Humza Yousaf to John Swinney. It’s brought impressive numbers on the website and news app, award-winning investigations from the Disclosure team, and a strong performance from Reporting Scotland.
“We need to make sure we keep changing our output as audience habits evolve so that we provide the best possible service in the formats and on the platforms they want.
"Scotcast and News at Seven will help do that, and we’re looking forward to bringing them to audiences at the start of 2025.”
The Scottish Government was opposed to the cut in news broadcasts due to concerns that “the quality of news reporting about Scotland and from a Scottish perspective could decline” and that audiences who are “likely to be more reliant on broadcast TV news” could be negatively impacted, according to an Ofcom report.
STV also expressed concerns about how the changes could impact their channel, saying that the proposed 7pm programme would be aimed at the same audiences as their current broadcasting in that slot, and questioned what BBC Scotland would look to fill the primetime 9pm slot with.
