Independent Radio News - History and Background

History and Background

IRN launched on 8 October 1973 with the first bulletin read at 0600 by Australian newsreader Ken Guy on the opening morning of Britain's first commercial radio station, LBC.

IRN was based at LBC studios in Fleet Street in London, and the service was funded by cash payments from subscribing radio stations.

Computer technology was introduced in 1985, and in 1987, the Newslink advertising scheme was launched which funded the service and provided cash dividends to client statons.

In 1989, satellite distribution of bulletins and audio was introduced. The satellite service was managed by SMS in Rugby.

In 1991, the Sunrise Radio IRN service was introduced. The hourly news bulletins were broadcast on Sunrise Radio's channel on the Astra satellite in a move designed to serve smaller commercial, RSL and hospital stations who struggled to afford the expensive standard IRN satellite equipment. This continued until 31 August 2004, upon which the service moved to a dedicated channel on the Hotbird 4 satellite at 13.0° East.

On 5 October 1992, ITN took over the running of the IRN operation from LBC and moved into ITN's headquarters on Gray's Inn Road in London.

In 2001, audio cuts began to be distributed via internet and from 2 October 2005, audio cuts and packages ceased being distributed via the satellite audio channels and switched entirely to the IRN Net Newsroom internet system.

IRN bulletins had a major overhaul in September 2002. The bulletin outcue for many years: "Independent Radio News", was dropped and all bulletins were of three minutes duration. All IRN branding was removed and the outcue reverted to a timecheck: "It's three minutes past XXX."

This bulletin, known as IRN 180, was broadcast on the IRN1 channel and the Astra (Sunrise Radio) feed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

A shorter 90-second bulletin, known as IRN 90, was introduced on the IRN2 channel comprising stories aimed at younger, pop music stations. This was broadcast on the hour from 1900 to 0600 on weekdays, and from 1400 to 0600 on weekends. This replaced the previous 60 second overnight bulletin service.

IRN launched its first bespoke bulletin service in September 2003, with an hourly bulletin service for Magic 105.4 and a breakfast news service for Kiss 100.

On 1 October 2003, satellite distribution of the main IRN service switched from SMS and the Intelsat 707 satellite at 1.0° West to Kingston Communications and the Sirius 2 satellite at 4.8° East.

In June 2008, IRN started supplying a feed of news, sport and entertainment stories and video to the websites of client radio stations.

During the ITN era, most audio came from ITV News and Channel 4 News television bulletins. Client stations contributed audio to the service and IRN also had agreements to use audio from CNN Radio and Sky Sports News.

On 15 October 2008, IRN announced that Sky News Radio was to replace ITN as its contracted news supplier from March 2009 for a three-year contract.

The final ITN-produced bulletin was broadcast at 1300 on Tuesday 2 March 2009, and was read by Moira Alderson. The bulletin finished: "... From ITN this is Independent Radio News".

Sky News Radio's first bulletin was at 1400 on the same day. The bulletin was read by Ursula Hansford, and was simulcast on Sky News television.