Virgin Media, TV3 to air Irish General Election results
February 26, 2016
UK quad-play operator Virgin Media is to be the first service to televise the live results of the Irish election in the UK.
Virgin Media will broadcast TV3’s Sunday night VOTE 2016 – Election Results Special show hosted by Ivan Yates and Colette Fitzpatrick to millions of homes in the UK via its TiVo platform on channel 996.
Following Virgin Media’s acquisition of TV3 in 2015, the move means the Irish diaspora and those following politics in the UK will have access to TV3’s programme live for the first time.
The programme will be broadcast live from the Virgin Media TV3 HD Studio in Dublin from 7pm to 9pm on Sunday and will feature interviews with party leaders, strategists and political commentators who will speculate on the deal-making that will be required to form the next coalition.
Virgin Media Chief Digital Entertainment Officer, David Bouchier, said: “This breaks new ground for our TV service at Virgin Media. Firstly, we are able to create a new service, which we can turn live for a few hours, which no other platform is able to do. Secondly, in doing so we are able to create content to take advantage of exciting news and current affairs issues that we believe will appeal to our viewers. Finally, we hope this will be the first of many opportunities to work with TV3 to offer originated programming to the wider UK audience.”
TV3 Group Managing Director, Pat Kiely, said: “I am delighted that we are providing viewers in the UK unique access to our Vote 2016 Results via our colleagues in Virgin Media. This is a new opportunity for the Irish diaspora and UK viewers to engage with the General Election across the Virgin Media network of millions of homes in the UK.”