The body which regulates all commercial television in this country is under fire at

The body, which regulates all commercial television in this country, is under fire at a time when it is trying to define its role under a new chief executive in a rapidly changing media world.
Last week, the High Court heard the opening shots in Virgin’s battle to overturn the ITC’s decision to award the Channel 5 licence to Channel 5 Broadcasting. He has served the cause of TV regulation since 1970, when he joined the ITC’s predecessor, the Independent Broadcasting Authority It is the ITC itself that is generating rancour. Everyone will wear evening dress, drink fine wine, bitch about each other and tell Mr Glencross how much they will miss him And almost all of them will be lying

They are not angry with Mr Glencross personally. The circulation losses have created pressures that cannot long be ignored.. On 12 February the Royal Television Society is throwing a farewell bash for David Glencross CBE, chief executive of the Independent Television Commission. But he is unlikely to have the luxury of 10 years to turn around the Standard, the period over which he revamped the Telegraph. For the first time in 10 years, the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday may come under serious attack from the Express and the Sunday Express, whose new editors, Richard Addis and Sue Douglas, have been assured of secure budgets by their boss, Lord Stevens.

There is concern at the Standard that management attention is being focused almostly wholly on this middle market battle, and on Sir David’s pet project, the money- sapping Channel One, a London cable channel.As a result, Mr Hastings may be left to his own devices. “There is no agenda to move up or down market,” says a senior editorial executive. “This is a unique paper, read by peers, managers, taxi drivers and the unemployed.”Nationally, the middle market is dominated by the Standard’s sister publication, the Daily Mail. A plan announced last year and then shelved, to drop the early edition, could be revived although Mr Hastings is said to be worried about the effect on circulation.More broadly, Mr Hastings is unlikely to make changes to the newspaper’s middle market character. The bad news was that he thought we were crap, too.”Now that Mr Hastings is taking a calmer line, morale has improved. But few expect the blood-letting to be over, even if there are no plans to introduce across-the-board redundancies.

“More people will go, replaced with people preferred by Hastings,” says one senior journalist.He is believed to favour a more “news-led” approach, with features linked to breaking stories “There has been something of a relaunch,” says one insider. “There’s been particular attention to features, which had gone badly wrong.”Mr Hastings is equally concerned with minutiae, to judge by a memo recently sent to journalists demanding certain words be banished, including “dream home,” “limousine” and, bizarrely, “toilet”.He is considering returning the pink City pages to white in order to improve photographic reproduction. Insiders relate that Mr Hasting walked in, ignored the gathered and expectant hacks, and entered the office of the then section editor, Ian Griffiths. Ten minutes later, Mr Hastings strode out, again avoiding any contact with staff.Mr Griffiths, according to one journalist, “gathered us around and said he had some good news and some bad news. The good news was that [Mr Hastings] thought sport was the worst section of the paper. One senior executive says: “Max said it was very different from when he arrived at the Telegraph There, he thought there was a lot of work to do. But at the Standard, he has no intention of changing things radically.” Another added: “The paper needs to be a bit tighter, and of course he is looking at the whole operation.

But there are no plans for a major redesign.”This “softly softly” approach is in marked contrast to his first visit to the City section last year. Significantly, he managed to convince Don Berry, the production chief upon whom he relied at the Telegraph, to move with him to the Standard.Mr Hastings, who is being paid pounds 300,000 a year, is said now to have changed tack, gathering together groups of executives and reporters to discuss his plans and to listen to their ideas.He is expected to move less precipitously now that the first wave of departures has been announced. He accepted a plan by the features editor, Alex Renton, to take a sabbatical. He moved Michael Herd, formerly sports editor, back into that job, and installed Anthony Hilton, the venerable financial journalist, as City editor. Within weeks, he had sacked the sports editor, Brian Alexander, and the City editor, Ian Griffiths, who were responsible for what he saw as the worst parts of the paper. He also wants to give the newspaper a higher, agenda-setting profile, although this will be difficult given its local character.According to insiders, Mr Hastings’ initial moves were dramatic if morale sapping.