The Glenn Dyer breakdown: A far better night for Seven as Nine couldn’t, or wouldn’t sustain its programming gambit from Monday night. Even though Seven had a clean sweep last night, the winning margin in Melbourne was the narrowest of the five metro markets.

Seven’s News at 6pm did better as well, but Melbourne remains a black hole, as does Brisbane. My Kitchen Rules saw its audience rise nicely to more than 1.9 million viewers in metro markets and a very tasty 2.828 million nationally. My Kitchen Rules is getting a boost from non-food story lines, such as Jessie and Biswa from last week and the so-called “cheating” line from last night. That’s an interesting way to grab and hold viewers, and it’s working. Home and Away was reliable at 7pm with 963,000 metro and nearly 1.5 million national viewers.

My Kitchen Rules helped a weak Packed To The Rafters remain alive — more than 1.3 million metro and 2.11 million national viewers watched it. But Rafters remains more popular in regional areas at the moment. With My Kitchen Rules in the schedule tonight and tomorrow night, Seven will win the week in metro markets. It already won the week after last night’s effort in regional markets where it was an absolute blitzing — Prime/7Qld winning by almost 16 percentage points. Seven again dominated the important demos from 16 through 54.

An audience of 1.338 million and 1.085 million metro viewers watched Today Tonight‘s second night in its new form. A Current Affair fell to 922,000 metro and 1.134 million national viewers.

But the real star in news and current affairs last night was Australian Story on ABC1 at 8pm. An audience of 616,000 metro and 912,000 national viewers saw a sensational story on the mysterious death of an Australian man in an Israeli jail. His name is suspected, but in Israel he was known as Prisoner X and the government threw a censorship blanket over his existence, so secret was the story in that country, but not in Australia.

Ten was barely OK, stronger than Monday night, but not at Sunday night’s level of interest. The continuing weakness in its Tuesday night mainstay NCIS must be worry — 697,000 metro and less than a million national viewers (980,000) isn’t good. It used to be a 1.2-1.4 million metro program alone!

Tonight: Home and Away, then My Kitchen Rules on Seven tonight and then a weak movie. The Block All Stars on Nine for half an hour then the final international TV cricket match of the year, the T20 tip and run from Brisbane between the Windies and Australia. The second part of Shock Horror Aunty on ABC1. The fading Glee on Ten. On SBS ONE at 9.30pm a look at John Maynard Keynes.

BBC axe update: In London the BBC has ended The Hour, the hour-long program about a mythical BBC current affairs program from the 1950s (which seemed to be applying 2012 values to 60 years ago). It was seen here on ABC1. The BBC had produced two series, but won’t commit to a third because ratings fell sharply in the second series.

The top 10 national programs (metro & regional combined):

  1. My Kitchen Rules (Seven) — 2.828 million.
  2. Packed To The Rafters (Seven) — 2.121 million.
  3. Seven News — 1.753 million.
  4. Nine News — 1.634 million.
  5. Home and Away (Seven) — 1.494 million.
  6. The Big Bang Theory (Nine) — 1.399 million.
  7. ABC1 News — 1.369 million.
  8. The Block All Stars (Nine) — 1.364 million.
  9. Today Tonight (Seven) — 1.338 million.
  10. A Current Affair (Nine, 6.30 – 7 pm) — 1.134 million.

The Metro Winners: Four fewer programs with a million viewers or more last night than on Monday night.

  1. My Kitchen Rules (Seven, 7.30pm) — 1.916million.
  2. Packed To The Rafters (Seven, 8.45pm) — 1.325 million.
  3. Seven News — 1.211 million.
  4. Nine News — 1.115 million.
  5. Today Tonight (Seven, 6.30pm) — 1.085 million.

The Losers: Ten and some viewers of Nine. The Block All Stars fell back with the reversion to the normal week night program from Monday night’s reveal. But it is still doing better than MasterChef: The Professionals which had 534,000 metro and 700,000 national viewers, which is clearly not enough.Metro News & CA: A better night for Seven News and TT.

  1. Seven News (6pm) — 1.211 million.
  2. Nine News (6pm) — 1.115 million.
  3. Today Tonight (Seven, 6.30pm) — 1.085 million.
  4. ABC1 News (7pm) — 962,000.
  5. A Current Affair (Nine, 6.30pm) — 922,000.
  6. 7.30 (ABC1, 7.30pm) — 693,000.
  7. Ten News (5pm) — 644,000.
  8. Foreign Correspondent (ABC1, 8pm) — 616,000.
  9. The Project (Ten, 6.30pm) — 481,000.
  10. Ten Late News 10.30pm) — 220,000.
  11. Insight (SBS ONE, 8.30pm) — 184,000.
  12. World News Australia (SBS ONE, 6.30pm) — 160,000.
  13. SBS ONE News (9.30pm) — 146,000.
  14. Lateline (ABC1, 10.30pm) — 127,000.
  15. The Business (ABC1, 11.05pm) — 74,000.
  16. The Drum (News 24, 12pm repeat) — 50,000.
  17. SBS ONE Late News (10.30pm) — 42,000.

In the morning:

  1. Sunrise (Seven, 7am) — 362,000
  2. Today (Nine, 7am) — 339,000.
  3. The Morning Show (Seven, 9am) — 139,000.
  4. Mornings (Nine, 9am) — 126,000.
  5. News Breakfast (ABC1, 7am) — 56,000 + 31,000 on News 24. *

*On News 24 simulcast

Metro FTA: Seven (three channels) won clearly with a share of 37.3%, from Nine (three) on 24.2%, Ten (three) was on 17.1%, the ABC (four) was on 16.3% and SBS (three) ended with 5.1%. Seven has extended its lead and now sits on 34.4% with Nine on 27.7%, the ABC on 16.9%, Ten on 16.8% and SBS on 4.1%. Main Channels: Seven won clearly with 30.9%, from Nine on 18.3%, Ten on 12.7% and SBS ONE on 3.6%. Seven leads the week on 27.7% from Nine on 21.7%, ABC1 is on 12.8%, Ten is on 12.4% and SBS ONE is on 3.1%

Metro Digital: Another low viewing night. 7TWO won narrowly with 3.7%, from GO on 3.6%. ABC2 and 7mate were on 2.7% each, Eleven was on 2.5%, Gem ended with 2.4%, ONE was on 1.9%, SBS TWO was on 1.4%, News 24 was on 1.0%, ABC3 was on 0.8% and NITV ended with 0.1%. The 11 digital channels had another low FTA share of 22.7%. 7TWO leads the week with 3.6% from GO on 3.3%.

 Metro including pay TV: Seven (three channels) won clearly with a share of 31.2%, from Nine (three) on 20.3%, Ten (three) was on 14.3%, the ABC (four) was on 13.6% and SBS (three) ended with 4.3%. The 16 FTA channels share of viewing last night was 85.8%, made up of a low 19.9% for the 11 digital channels and 65.9% for the five main channels. Pay TV’s share edged up to 14.2% last night for the 200 plus channels on Foxtel.

The top five pay TV channels were:

  1. TV 1, Fox8 — 2.6%.
  2. LifeStyle — 2.1%.
  3. Fox Classics — 1.8%.
  4. FX– 1.6%.
  5. Sky News, Arena — 1.5%.

The five most-watched programs on pay TV were:

  1. The Walking Dead (FX, 8.30 – 9.25 pm) — 136,000.
  2. The Simpsons (Fox 8) — 65,000.
  3. Seinfeld (TV1) — 62,000.
  4. The Walking Dead (FX, 7.30 – 8.30 pm0 — 57,000.
  5. Coronation Street (UKTV) — 57,000.

Regional: Prime/7Qld won easily with a share of 40.6%, from WIN/NBN on 24.7%, SC Ten (three) was third with 14.9%, the ABC (four) was on 14.6% and SBS (three) ended on 5.2%. Prime/7Qld won the main channels with 32.2% from WIN/NBN on 17.8%, SC Ten was on 10.5% and ABC1 was on 9.8%. Meanwhile, 7TWO won the digitals with 4.3% from 7mate on 4.0% and GO on 3.7%. The 11 digital channels had an FTA share last night of 25.8%, which remains low by level for much of 2012. Prime/7Qld leads the week with 35.6% (and has the week won with WIN/NBN on 30.0%, the ABC is on 15.9% and SC Ten on 14.3%.

The five most-watched programs in regional markets were:

  1. My Kitchen Rules — 901,000.
  2. Packed To The Rafters — 797,000.
  3. Seven News — 543,000.
  4. Home and Away — 534,000.
  5. Nine News — 524,000.

Major Metro Markets: A clean sweep to Seven (overall and main channels) in all five metro markets. Nine was second and Ten third in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. In Adelaide and Perth, Ten was third overall, but ABC1 was third in the main channels. 7TWO won the digitals in Sydney and Melbourne. GO won Adelaide and Perth. 7mate won Brisbane. Seven now leads the week everywhere, including Melbourne. Nine is second, and the ABC is third (narrowly) in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth. Ten is still third in Brisbane.

(All shares on the basis of combined overnight 6pm to midnight All People)

Source: Oztam, TV Networks data