It was Seven’s night with the clean-up of the finals of the BBL (763,000 viewers). The rain-interrupted match in Canberra was enough to give Seven the lead in total people and in the main channels. Nine and Ten didn’t really put up a fight.
The ABC, however, started a new look Thursday line-up with Q+A moving to 8.30pm instead of 9.35pm on Mondays. They moved the popular Back Roads to 8pm from Mondays at the same time, but that didn’t help with viewer turn-off. Back Roads averaged a solid 755,000 national viewers and tied for ninth spot nationally. Q+A averaged 435,000 and 22nd nationally. That’s a nasty drop of 320,000: a thumbs down from the ABC’s core audience.
In the breakfast slot, it was another weak morning for Nine’s Today (279,000 nationally, and 189,000 in the metros). That ranked a distant third behind Seven’s Sunrise and the ABC’s News Breakfast. It isn’t as weak as a year ago, but still not great.
Network channel share
- Seven (31.7%)
- Nine (21.9%)
- ABC (17.7%)
- Ten (17.6%)
- SBS (11.1%)
Network main channels
- Seven (21.0%)
- Nine (15.3%)
- ABC (12.1%)
- Ten (10.2%)
- SBS ONE (6.1%)
Top five digital channels
- 7mate (5.1%)
- 7TWO (4.0%)
- 10 Bold (3.7%)
- 10 Peach (3.0%)
- SBS Viceland (2.9%)
Top 10 national programs
- Seven News — 1.419 million
- Seven News 6.30 — 1.377 million
- Nine News 6.30— 1.089 million
- Nine News — 1.062 million
- 7pm ABC News — 961,000
- A Current Affair (Nine) — 851,000
- BBL Challenge, Session 1 (Seven) — 814,000
- 7.30 (ABC) — 769,000
- Back Roads (ABC) — 755,000
Metro news and current affairs
- Seven News — 917,000
- Seven News 6.30 —870,000
- Nine News — 853,000
- Nine News 6.30 — 813,000
- 7pm ABC News —654,000
- ACA (Nine) — 592,000
- 7.30 (ABC) — 485,000
- The Project 7pm (Ten) — 371,000
- Ten News First —322,000
- The Project 6.30 (Ten) — 231,000
Morning (national) TV
- Sunrise (Seven) — 474,000/292,000
- News Breakfast (ABC) — 317,000/214,000
- Today (Nine) — 279,000/187,000
- The Morning Show (Seven) — 236,000
- Today Extra (Nine) — 154,000
- Studio 10 (Ten) — 50,000
Top five pay TV programs
- Cricket: BBL Challenge (Fox Cricket) — 279,000
- Cricket: BBL Between the Innings (Fox Cricket) — 227,000
- Cricket: BBL Challenge (Fox Cricket) — 224,000
- Cricket: BBL Post Game (Fox Cricket) — 101,000
- Cricket: B4 The Bash (Fox Cricket) — 94,000
Thursday night is too late in the week for an issues-laden show like Q&A. Most of us are already focusing on the weekend and sport. It needs to go back to Monday night or Tuesday (if it wants an 8.30 start).
For some reason, but who’s arguing, Monday nights are when people like to know about news and issues. Just look at Monday night news bulletin figures compared to those later in the week. So the previous issues-angled Monday ABC lineup fed nicely into that tendency.
This year the lack of Q&A after Media watch is like a missing front tooth.
And then .. sadly, the program has become so “naice “. The Right could bitch about Tony Jones and everyone else could do the same about the political fights that periodically stopped progress and/or enlightenment, but both were actually a strong drawcard for the complainants!
The focus on Alexander Downer, so smug, patrician and born to rule along with Warren Mundine from the beginning was a terrible start and they got so much air time. It isn’t the time but the pandering to the Liberal Party and its hacks. There were ignored questions and no answers.
Agreed. It’s a lost cause. Politicians kill it. Experts enhance the show but far too few experts appear. No answers, no initiatives, no progress.
Was it Q&A or Hamish?