Election Week TV Ratings

26Nov07

Source: David Dale, Sydney Morning Herald

When big events happen, Australians prefer calm, sensible reportage –
even with occasional computer glitches — to bells and whistles.
Channel Seven shot itself in the foot by promising its election
coverage would be a laugh a minute.

Mel and Kochy and that panel of boofy boys who kept interrupting each
other averaged only 967,000 viewers in the mainland capitals, while the
ABC, with Kerry O’Brien, Julia Gillard and Nick Minchin, averaged 1.1
million.

Nine’s Grumpy Old Men — Ray Martin, Laurie Oakes and Joe Hockey,
plus a token Tanya — averaged just 763,000, which meant the Nine
coverage fell behind Ten’s repeat of The Empire Strikes Back (869,000). Well, Empire IS the best of the Star Wars Series.

This column was shocked on Saturday night to discover we’d been a
more accurate predicter of the election result than many pollsters.
Last week The Tribal Mind observed that the nation has been in a "sit
forward" mood this year, which was reflected in higher audiences for
Channel Seven and lower audiences for Channel Nine.

In fact, the fortunes of Nine and Seven were running parallel with
the fortunes of John Howard and Kevin Rudd.
Working out a "two party preferred" vote based on the two networks’
shares of the prime time audience, we said Rudd would draw "just over
52 per cent " and Howard would draw "just below 48 per cent". We can’t
wait till the 2010 election to see if ratings-based psephology works
again.

Seven won last week with an average of 28.9 per cent of the prime
time audience, with Nine on 26.5, Ten on 20.8, ABC on 19.0 and SBS on
4.8.

What Australia watched, week ending 24/11/2007
1 CITY HOMICIDE Seven 1,763,000
2 SURF PATROL Seven 1,687,000
3 BORDER SECURITY (R) Seven 1,685,000
4 DANCING WITH THE STARS Seven 1,646,000
5 CSI Nine 1,443,000
6 THE CHASER DECIDES 2007 ABC 1,418,000
7 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,404,000
8 BETTER HOMES AND GARDENS Seven 1,403,000

9 60 MINUTES Nine 1,368,000
10 HOUSE 4 Ten 1,359,000
11 MISSING PERSONS UNIT Nine 1,343,000
12 AUSTRALIAN IDOL Ten 1,341,000
13 SPICKS AND SPECKS ABC 1,332,000
14 ALL SAINTS Seven 1,329,000
15 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,301,000

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