More than 1.5m tune in to election debate

IN the television ratings battle between The X Factor and Australia’s Got Talent, the winners were Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott.

IN the television ratings battle between The X Factor and AustraliaÂ’s Got Talent, the winners were Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott.

Seven’s reality talent quest The X Factor received another fillip by scoring 1.314 million metro viewers (and 1.9 million nationally) last night to beat the launch of Nine’s version of Australia’s Got Talent (1.044 million) but both were bettered by the Leaders’ Debate’s 1.5 million viewers.

Both shows were swamped by the cross-network coverage of the first debate between the Prime Minister and Opposition Leader.

The new talent contests on Seven and Nine also pushed Sunday Night and 60 Minutes out of their normal 6.30pm and 7.30pm slots respectively. With both current affairs programs facing off at 8pm, 60 Minutes can claim a minor victory with an average 1.162 million viewers in the five metropolitan markets for the hour against Sunday Night’s 1.075 million.

The Leaders’ Debate screened simultaneously across a number of channels with the biggest audience on ABC1, which attracted 708,000 viewers.

The Nine Network’s coverage on its multichannel Gem averaged 233,000 while Seven’s "News Special" on 7TWO had a similar audience of 228,000 viewers. In contrast, the opening session of the third day of the fourth Ashes cricket test, which followed the debate, scored 504,000 viewers over two hours.

The simulcast on ABC’s HD multichannel ABC News 24 added another 198,000 viewers and Ten’s broadcast on ONE averaged 134,000 suggesting a live audience for the political debate in the five capital cities across all networks of more than 1.5 million viewers, making it the most popular program of the night.

The top two single-transmission programs for the evening were the commercial 6pm news bulletins, with Seven News averaging 1.354 million viewers and Nine News 1.347 million. Nine News won by almost 200,000 viewers (185,000) in Sydney although Seven pulled back its usual margin in Melbourne to only 70,000 viewers.

The X Factor lost 200,000 viewers from last week but that was minor compared with the weak debut for AGT despite a solid promotional campaign from Nine. Seven allowed its deal to broadcast AGT to lapse after waning ratings and Nine has picked it up, with this year's judging panel including Kyle Sandilands, Dawn French, Geri Halliwell and Timomatic.

Nine’s other worry will be Underbelly Squizzy, which fell to 772,000 and was beaten by Seven’s Bones (801,000) although both were put to air after 9pm. At 8.30pm, ABC1’s The Time of Our Lives averaged 718,000 viewers while Ten’s drama Ripper Street averaged 481,000.

Seven won the night with a 22.7 per cent channel share and 32.4 per cent network share. Nine's main channel had a share of 19.4 per cent but even a strong 9.0 per cent share for Gem could not push the network into the top position: its network share was 32.1.

Ten had a 10.2 per cent channel share against ABC1’s 12.1 per cent.

OZTAM OVERNIGHT RANKINGS, AUGUST 11
1 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,354,000
2 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,347,000
3 THE X FACTOR Seven 1,314,000
4 60 MINUTES Nine 1,162,000
5 SUNDAY NIGHT Seven 1,075,000
6 AUSTRALIA'S GOT TALENT Nine 1,044,000
7 ABC NEWS ABC1 821,000
8 BONES Seven 801,000
9 UNDERBELLY: SQUIZZY Nine 772,000
10 GRAND DESIGNS REVISITED ABC1 771,000
11 THE TIME OF OUR LIVES ABC1 718,000
12 AUSTRALIA VOTES: LEADERS' DEBATE ABC1 708,000
13 MASTERCHEF AUSTRALIA Ten 699,000
14 CASTLE Seven 539,000
15 THE MID-YEAR ASHES: FOURTH TEST-ENG V AUS SESSION 1 Gem 504,000
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