Alastair James Stewart OBE (born June 22, 1952) is a British television newsreader. He is currently with the British news organisation ITN, for whom he presents some ITV News bulletins, and anchors ITV London's daily early-evening news programme London Tonight with Katie Derham. He received an OBE from the Queen in June 2006 for his services in broadcasting.
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Education and early career
Alastair Stewart was educated at St. Augustine's Abbey School, a boys' Independent school in Kent, Southern England. He studied economics, politics and sociology at Bristol University and became Deputy President of the National Union of Students, 1974-76, after being beaten to the presidency by Charles Clarke, the subsequent Labour cabinet minister and Home Secretary. His career in Television started in 1976 with ITV's south of England company, Southern Television, in Southampton. He was a reporter, industrial correspondent, presenter and documentary maker. He recorded one of the last interviews with Lord Mountbatten, and even spent six weeks in Ford Open Prison to make a half hour documentary.
At ITN, 1980-92
He joined ITN in 1980 as industrial correspondent, soon joining its roster of additional newsreaders. From 1983 to 1986 he was a presenter and reporter with ITN's Channel 4 News, before moving in September 1986 to present ITN's News at 5.40, taking over from Michael Nicholson. He moved again in May 1989, to ITN's flagship News at Ten bulletin, which he anchored live from the fall of the Berlin Wall, before spending a year in the United States as ITN's Washington Correspondent. Four days after returning from his assignment in Washington he was sent to Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, to anchor ITN's coverage of the Gulf War. He presented News at Ten, live from Saudi Arabia for two months. At the end of February, Alastair was the first British television reporter to be broadcast, live from the liberated Kuwait City. He presented News at Ten from Kuwait for a week before returning to the UK. ITN's network coverage of the 1992 Budget saw the ninth year of Alastair's involvement in the presentation of this annual event for ITV. It was his fifth year anchoring the programme having taken the role from Sir Alastair Burnet. During his time with ITN he also provided the commentary for many of ITN's other special programmes on the ITV network including the State Openings of Parliament, numerous by-elections, State Visits and for the Royal Weddings of the Prince and Princess of Wales and Duke and Duchess of York. Alastair provided live coverage of the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster as the details of the tragedy unfolded. A two minute news-flash became an unscripted, one hour special programme. He also anchored, with Sandy Gall, the award winning coverage on ITN on the night of the bombing of the Pan Am jet over Lockerbie; and presented the ITV network coverage of the Memorial Service for the victims. However, when News at Ten moved to a single-presenter format in 1992, he lost out to Trevor McDonald in the race to become the face of the programme.
London Tonight and recent activity
Since 1992, Alastair Stewart has been most visible as the co-presenter of London Tonight, the ITV regional news programme for London. London Tonight was produced by the London News Network, a joint venture between Carlton Television and LWT established in 1992 when Carlton was awarded the London weekday ITV franchise previously held by Thames. However, following LNN's absorption by ITN in 2004, Stewart is now once again at his old employers, returning as an anchor on the ITV News Channel for the 2003 Iraq War, ITV's Local Government Elections coverage and a special programme on the European Single Currency. Alastair won the Royal Television Society's Presenter of the Year Award for 2004 for his live coverage of the Beslan siege, and news presenter of the year at the 2005 RTS awards for his 'Live with Alastair Stewart' morning slot on the ITV News Channel. The ITV News Channel was discontinued in 2005, but Stewart's role on London Tonight continues, and he can also be seen presenting the ITV Lunchtime News, and also the ITV News at 10.30 on ITV. According to his biography on the ITN website, he is "one of the very few people who has, at one time or another, presented all of ITN's main news programmes". He has also been a regular presence in ITV's national election coverage, co-anchoring ITV's network coverage of the 2005 and 1997 General Election with Jonathan Dimbleby and Michael Brunson (1997 only); the 1992 General Election with Jon Snow; and the 1987 General Election with Sir Alastair Burnet. Other programmes he has presented since 1992 include Alastair Stewart's Sunday for BBC Radio 5 in 1994, before moving to host Alastair Stewart's Sunday Programme for GMTV, which he presented until July 2001. He also presented a programme called Police Camera Action!, showing video footage of examples of road crime from police cars. But in 2003, he had to give this up after his second conviction for drink driving[1]. Episodes that had already been recorded for broadcast in 2002 were finally shown in January 2006. However, in September 2007, a new series of Police Camera Action! had returned to screens, primarily with new presenter Adrian Simpson, but with Alastair being reinstated to introduce and conclude each episode. He has recently hosted a political programme on ITV, called 'Moral of the Story', which aired on Sunday nights, the first series has now ended, but there are rumours suggesting it may be replacing ITV's 'The Sunday Edition', in the Sunday morning slot. Alastair is married to Sally, a former TV Production Assistant, and they have three sons and one daughter, Clementine, who recently appeared on BBC Three's "Filthy Rich And Homeless" where five people from a wealthy background with little real world experience outside home and/or commerce lived as the homeless for 4 3-night sessions each sleeping rough, with 'buddies' and in hostels. Clementine caused some controversy on the show when on the 3rd day of her rough-sleeping stint she visited the studios of GMTV and obtained money from family friend Fern Britton which she used to sleep in a youth hostel. Clementine's sleeping bag was taken away as a punishment. Her subsequent dispute over the program's editorial process with Love Productions, who made the program, was reported in Broadcast Magazine.
External links
- Interview for justpeople.com, 29 September 2000.
- Interview for Broadcast magazine, 24 March 2005.
- Do students care anymore? Article by Alastair Stewart for Cherwell student newspaper, 20 January 2006.
- Alastair Stewart at TV Ark
