Turnbull and Shorten can’t beat reality TV

A leaders’ debate between the PM and Opposition Leader failed to ignite viewers, ranking fourth in its timeslot, well down on the 2013 Rudd-Abbott debate

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, Left, and Opposition Leader Bill Shorten walk away after shaking hands as they arrive for the leaders' debate at the National Press Club in Canberra, Sunday, May, 29, 2016. (AP Photo/Tracey Nearmy/Pool)

The Prime Minister and Opposition Leader may have grand plans but they have nothing on Kevin McCloud and Grand Designs.

The formal debate between Malcolm Turnbull and Bill Shorten on the ABC averaged 529,000 capital city viewers, ranking fourth in its timeslot behind the commercial networks’ Sunday night reality TV roster.

Worse for both parties was the debate dropped more than a third of the audience, week-on-week, normally watching in the ABC timeslot most recently taken by British renovation program, Grand Designs. Just as instructive is the fact the commercial networks chose not to simulcast the debate, as they did in 2013 for the debate between Tony Abbott and PM Kevin Rudd. That 2013 debate averaged 708,000 viewers for the ABC despite also being simulcast on Gem, 7TWO, ABC News 24 and One.

The beneficiaries on Sunday night were the big reality programs with Nine’s The Voice recovering from registering its smallest audience during the week to average 1.303 million viewers to win its timeslot.

Seven’s House Rules has recovered dramatically from a slow season start, last night averaging 1.24 million metro viewers, almost 20 per cent up in its previous best result for the year. It hurt Ten’s MasterChef Australia, which dropped 15 per cent from last week to 808,000 viewers.

60 Minutes’ mea culpa for its botched kidnapping averaged 778,000 metro viewers for Nine, near its 2016 average and Seven’s Sunday Night averaged a thin 615,000.

Seven News was the top show for the day with 1.425 million metro viewings, including 435,000 in Melbourne, ahead of Nine News’ 1.237 million.

Seven was helped by its Sunday afternoon football recording one of its better results for the year, a 487,000 metro average, thanks to a tight Collingwood and Western Bulldogs match in Melbourne and West Coast Eagles playing in Perth.

Nine and Seven split the night with equal channel shares of 22.0 per cent ahead of Ten’s 13.6 per cent and ABC’s 11.1 per cent. Nine won in network share with 30.2 per cent ahead of Seven’s 28.3 per cent

In other Sunday sport, Daniel Ricciardo’s unfortunate second place in the Monaco Formula 1 Grand Prix averaged 190,000 national viewers for Fox Sports — its best audience for the F1 this year other than the Melbourne race — and 293,000 metro viewers for Ten. And in the NBA, the Golden State Warriors’ win against the Oklahoma City Thunder averaged a season-high 81,000 national viewers for ESPN.

Preliminary OzTAM viewers, Sunday 29 May 2016

1 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,424,000

2 THE VOICE Nine 1,303,000

3 HOUSE RULES Seven 1,240,000

4 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,237,000

5 MASTERCHEF AUSTRALIA Ten 808,000

6 ABC NEWS SUNDAY ABC 792,000

7 60 MINUTES Nine 778,000

8 MIDSOMER MURDERS ABC 676,000

9 SUNDAY NIGHT Seven 615,000

10 AUSTRALIA VOTES: LEADERS’ DEBATE ABC 529,000

11 FAMILY FEUD SUNDAY Ten 522,000

12 SEVEN’S AFL: SUNDAY AFTERNOON FOOTBALL Seven 487,000

13 MODERN FAMILY EP 2 RPT Ten 471,000

14 BONDI RESCUE Ten 372,000

15 MODERN FAMILY RPT Ten 367,000