At last, a program that explained the independent movement in Saturday’s election: Australian Story (720,000 nationally) profiled groundbreaker Cathy Haines, who tossed out the Liberal Party’s Sophie Mirabella from the Victorian rural seat of Indi and provided the model for the rise of independents in the 2019 and now 2022 federal polls.
Nine’s Lego Masters finally cracked the million-viewer mark with the winner’s announcement (1.029 million); the final averaged 972,000. And that gave Nine the win on the night as the absence of The Voice saw Seven forced to fall back on Big Brother (563,000). On the ABC, 7.30 featured an interview with the PM — 799,000 nationally — but Australian Story was far more interesting.
Of course this was all overshadowed by the return for 2022 of Have You Been Paying Attention? (915,000) to Ten.
And seven-day viewing data confirms the surge in viewers for Big Brother — the program debuted with 683,000 free-to-air viewers; another 103,000 watched over the next seven days, but BVOD viewers totalled 190,000, taking the program’s total audience after the week to 976,000, up 43%. That’s an echo of what Nine saw with Married at First Sight this year and last and what Nine saw with Love Island (where the BVOD audience was higher at times than the FTA audience).
Network channel share:
- Nine (29.1%)
- Seven (25.0%)
- Ten (20.6%)
- ABC (18.0%)
- SBS (7.3%)
Network main channels:
- Nine (21.0%)
- Seven (17.1%)
- Ten (15.3%)
- ABC (13.5%)
- SBS ONE (4.3%)
Top 5 digital channels:
- 7TWO (4.0%)
- Gem (3.0%)
- 10 Bold (2.9%)
- 7mate (2.6%)
- ABC News (2.3%).
Top 10 national programs:
- Seven News — 1.610 million
- Seven News 6.30 — 1.497 million
- Nine News 6.30 — 1.256 million
- Nine News — 1.251 million
- A Current Affair (Nine) — 1.065 million
- Lego Masters — winner announced (Nine) — 1.029 million
- Lego Masters — finale (Nine) — 972,000
- 7pm ABC News — 967,000
- Have You Been Paying Attention? (Ten) — 915,000
- The Chase Australia 5.30pm (Seven) — 910,000
Top metro programs: none with a million or more viewers.
Regional top 5: Seven News, 623,000; Seven News 6.30, 572,000; The Chase Australia 5.30pm, 359,000; Home and Away, 332,000; ACA, 329,000.
Losers: anyone who missed Have You Been Paying Attention?.
Metro news and current affairs:
- Seven News — 988,000
- Seven News 6.30 — 925,000
- Nine News — 934,000
- Nine News 6.30 — 931,000
- ACA (Nine) — 736,000
- 7pm ABC News — 639,000
- 7.30 (ABC) — 559,000
- Australian Story (ABC) — 491,000
- Four Corners (ABC) — 487,000
- Media Watch (ABC) — 481,000
Morning (national) TV:
- Sunrise (Seven) — 415,000/260,000
- Today (Nine) — 303,000/206,000
- News Breakfast (ABC) — 279,000/184,000
- Morning news (ABC) — 247,000
- The Morning Show (Seven) — 234,000
- Today Extra (Nine) — 153,000
- Studio 10 (Ten) — 38,000
Top 5 pay TV programs:
- Paul Murray Live (Sky News) — 87,000
- The Bolt Report (Sky News) — 78,000
- AFL: 360 (Fox Footy) — 69,000
- Credlin (Sky News) — 63,000
- The Rita Panahi Show (Sky News) — 55,000
