For decades, politicians feared that breakfast TV would turn Brits into zombies – or that broadcasting might decimate the workforce. This is the story of our long journey to 24-hour television
orty years ago, the battle of early morning broadcasting came to a head. ITV lost, debuting its first ever breakfast show, Good Morning Britain, on 1 February 1983 – a full 14 days after the launch of the BBC’s Breakfast Time. But this was just a mere skirmish in a much bigger war – one that stretched from the 1950s until almost the 21st century. The battleground? How much TV should be allowed in Britain.
Today it is shocking to see how restricted TV used to be. When ITV and BBC One launched their two cereal services, it marked the first time that weekday broadcasting started before 9.30am – extending UK broadcasting by a combined five-and-three-quarter hours every morning. But once Good Morning Britain signed off at 9.15am, it was followed by a 15-minute slot of dead air, before school programming began at 9.30am.
This on-off programming was partly due to daytime broadcasting being almost exclusively for schools – older Britons will remember TV sets being wheeled into the classroom – or preschoolers at home. The intervals or closedowns were a buffer zone to avoid young eyes accidentally catching grownup shows.
Parkinson left to join TV-am, ITV’s breakfast franchise, leading parliament to fret about his stretching of the schedules at the other end. In July 1981, a Home Office minister reported that multiple MPs had tried to block breakfast TV.
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