Alastair Stewart – Keynote Speaker

Alastair Stewart also co-presented LWT’s Missing Programme for the ITV Network. Stewart presents GMTV’s Sunday programme a news and current affairs magazine, interviewing the week’s top newsmakers. He also presents Police Camera Action for the ITV Network, which achieved Carlton’s highest rating for a factual programme.

Before joining LNN, he was a presenter of ITN’s News At Ten, a role he resumed in 1991 following 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 1991, Alastair was the first British television reporter to broadcast, live from the liberated Kuwait City. He presented News At Ten from Kuwait for a week before returning to the UK. Alastair subsequently presented Scottish TV’s special coverage of the Gulf Was Service of Thanksgiving, attended by HM The Queen, for ITV network.

He originally joined News At Ten in May 1989 from ITN’s News At Five Forty, which he presented from September 1986. Before that he spent three years as a presenter and reporter with ITN’s Channel Five News. He was also the presenter of ITN’s The Parliament Programme for Channel Four. Alastair Stewart is one of the very few people who has, at one time or another, presented all of ITN’s main News programmes. Alastair joined ITN as an Industrial Correspondent in 1980 and had his first taste of news casting one-year later.

ITN’s network coverage of the 1992 Budget saw the ninth year of Stewart’s involvement in the presentation of this special programme for ITV. It was his fifth year anchoring the programme having taken over the role from Sir Alastair Burnet. Alastair co-anchored ITN’s network coverage-of the 1997 and 1992 General Elections, with Jon Snow, and the 1987 General Election with Sir Alastair Burnet.

Alastair Stewart has 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 the Duke Duchess of York.
Stewart provided live commentary 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.