ITV has confirmed that Andrew Rawnsley and Andrea Catherwood will front the channel’s new Sunday political show.
As reported in Press Gazette on 24 August, the programme will launch on 17 September in time for the start of the political conference season.
Deputy editor of current affairs programming at ITV Productions, Alex Gardiner said: “The long-form political interview originated on ITV with Weekend World. Now it is time to reinvigorate and reinvent the genre.
With The Sunday Edition we’ve adopted a thoroughly fresh and modern approach.”
The Sunday Edition will be a live studio based show featuring long format interviews interspersed with debate from key players in politics, the arts and business.
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The programme will start with breaking news items that will be updated by interviews with key figures and commentators, while the show will be centered around an in-depth political interview.
The final segment of the show will be a discussion on the major issues of the day featuring leading commentators from a variety of fields.
Rawnsley, who is the Observer’s chief political commentator and associate editor, said: “For me, after hosting political programmes for both Channel 4 and the BBC, this is an exciting new arena in which to interrogate the leading politicians, their policies and their promises.”
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Earlier today Catherwood announced she will step down from ITV News where she presents the weekend news bulletin.
She began her career as a journalist in 1985 when, at the age of 16, she joined the BBC in Belfast as a co-presenter of a youth current affairs programme for which she won BBC Northern Ireland's Young Presenter of the Year award.
Speaking about her new appointment she said in a statement: “This is my dream job. I hope to be able to bring my experience as a foreign correspondent and newscaster into the arena of political interviewing.
In a way it’s a natural progression, certainly one that I’d always hoped I’d make. Andre and I are looking forward to working together and making the new show our own.”
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