It’s Manchester, not Mars
The news that the BBC's flagship morning programme, Breakfast, is moving to the new MediaCity in Salford showed that the Beeb is taking its investment in the North seriously.
At the weekend, the show's sport's presenter, Chris Hollins, dismissed the move as a "political decision."
While I accept that expecting the show's presenters (and their families) to up-sticks and move to Manchester is a big ask, it is a necessary part of this realignment of the BBC, which will benefit far more people than the handful of TV presenters it will inconvenience.
So while Collins's complaint has some merit, his argument that the show will struggle to attract big name personalities or politicians - who he believes will favour London-based GMTV, or Daybreak as it will be known from September - is more than a little naive.
One only has to look across the pond to see how this can work, where guests on US TV shows regularly travel to different time zones for their appearances.
Good Morning America is based in New York, while many TV drama shows are filmed in Los Angeles. And Oprah Winfrey hardly struggles to attract the big names, despite the fact her chat show is filmed in Chicago.
Breakfast's move to Manchester is an important step towards making the national media a little less London-centric, and if some comedian with a book to plug has to sit on a train for three hours to get there, then so be it.
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