The Winners: The final episode of In Their Footsteps on Nine at 6.30pm, 737,000. In a night made more confusing by the carbon tax specials, Seven won because an average of 1.470 million for nearly three hours beats 1.615 million for 90 minutes.

The 7.30pm program’s carbon tax special on the ABC, 378,000 (plus 40,000 on News 24). I know the issue is important and the ABC thinks it important, but viewers preferred cooking, dancing or 60 Minutes. It just beat Who Do You Think You Are? on SBS with 353,000. Another cost for the ABC that need not have happened. What was wrong with an extended news broadcast and analysis built in?

  1. MasterChef Australia (Ten) (7.30pm) — 1.615 million
  2. Seven News (6pm) — 1.473 million
  3. Dancing With The Stars (Seven) (6.35pm) — 1.470 million
  4. Seven News (Special carbon tax address) (6.25pm) — 1.350 million
  5. Nine News (6pm) — 1.326 million
  6. Nine News (Special carbon tax address) (Nine) (6.25pm) — 1.012 million

The Losers: Nine, a weak night. Midsomer Murder repeat on the ABC from 8.30pm, 582,000. The new cop starts in the new episodes next Sunday night. The Mentalist on Nine at 8.30pm, 603,000. Hawaii Five O on Ten from 9pm, 495,000.

News & CA: Nine News won Sydney thanks to the NRL, Seven News won the rest of the metro markets. Insiders won the morning chats, Weekend Sunrise won the morning happy talk, but Today is slowly closing, like Monday to Friday.

  1. Seven News (6pm) — 1.473 million
  2. Seven News Special (6.25pm) — 1.350 million
  3. Nine News (6pm) — 1.326 million
  4. Nine News Special carbon tax address (Nine) (6.25pm) — 1.012 million
  5. 60 Minutes (Nine) (7.30pm) — 934,000
  6. ABC 1 News (7pm)  — 587,000
  7. Ten Evening News (6pm) — 486,000
  8. Ten News (5pm) — 381,000
  9. 7.30 (Special carbon tax address) (ABC) (7.30pm) — 378,000
  10. SBS News (6.30pm) — 204,000
  11. Dateline (SBS) (8.30pm) — 139,000
  12. The Bolt Report (encore) (Ten) (4.30pm) — 136,000

In the morning:

  1. Weekend Sunrise (Seven) (8am) — 346,000
  2. Weekend Today (Nine) (8am) — 304,000
  3. Insiders (ABC) (9am) — 208,000
  4. Inside Business (ABC) (10am) — 174,000
  5. Offsiders (ABC) (10.30am) — 163,000
  6. The Bolt Report (Ten) (10am) — 153,000
  7. Meet The Press (Ten) (10.30am) — 115,000

The Stats:

  • FTA: Seven (3 channels) won with a share of 30.0%, from Ten (3) on 28.2%, Nine (3) on 23.0%, the ABC (4), 11.0% and SBS (2), 7.8%.
  • Main Channel: Seven won with a share of 24.1%, from Ten on 19.1%, Nine on 16.0%, ABC 1, 8.9% and SBS ONE, 6.1%. Apart from World Cup broadcasts, that’s the closest SBS’s main channel has been to toppling the ABC’s main channel for ages. It was more a case of the ABC simply sagging, thanks to the 7.30 carbon tax special which bombed.
  • Digital: ONE won with 5.6%, thanks to the F- 1 race last night. GO was next on 4.,4%, Eleven was on 3.4%, 7mate, 3.3%, 7TWO was on 2.7%, Gem was on 2.6%, SBS TWO was on 1.7%, ABC 2 was on 1.1%, News 24 was on 0.7% and ABC 3 ended up with 0.4%. That was a total FTA viewing share last night of 26.9%
  • Pay TV: Seven won (3 channels) with a share of 24.7%, from Ten (3) on 23.2%, Nine (3) was on 18.9%, Pay TV (100 plus channels) ended with 15.0%, the ABC (4) was on 9.1% and SBS (2) ended up with 6.4%. The 15 FTA channels had a total share of viewing last night of 85.0%. That was made up of the 10 digital channels with 21.2% and the five main channels on 63.8%.
  • Regional: Prime/7Qld (3 channels) won with a share of 30.7% from WIN/NBN (3) on 26.0%, SC Ten (3) was on 25.5%, the ABC (4) was on 11.8% and SBS (2) ended up with 6.0%. The main channels were won by Prime/7Qld with 23.3%, from WIN/NBN on 17.5% and SC Ten on 16.4%. ONE won the digital with 5.4%, thanks to the F 1 race. GO was next with 5.5% and 7mate was on 3.8%, The 10 digital channels had a total share of a high 29.5% in prime time last night.

Major Markets: A clean sweep for Seven with wins overall and the main channels in all five metro markets, Ten was second and Nine third. ONE won Sydney and Brisbane. GO won Melbourne and Adelaide. 7mate won Perth.

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

Glenn Dyer’s comments: Seven ended up winning All people nationally last week. Nine won the NRL markets in Sydney and Brisbane. Seven won the AFL markets of Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth. Seven won Friday and Saturday nights by surprisingly large margins and enough to put it over the top of Nine which had been leading well after Thursday night. 7TWO won the digitals. Nine’s State of Origin was by far the most watched program of the week and the year so far. WIN/NBN won the regionals for Nine, thanks to the Origin game and the Friday night NRL matches.

Dancing With the Stars finished last night: the season was better than Seven had hoped for. The winner was yet another newly-emerged Seven personality. Next week, at 6.30, Sunday Night returns, at 7.30 it has a new program called Great Migrations and then the final episode of Downton Abbey at 8.40pm.

The carbon tax chats from Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott grabbed a million or more viewers in the metro markets and made the top 10 most watched list. In regional areas they didn’t show up at all, which I think is interesting.

In fact, MasterChef‘s US adventure explains why there’s cost cutting and angst at Ten. No one was watching the pennies. Why did the whole MasterChef crew have to fly off to New York? A jaunt for everyone involved, at Ten’s expense? The question was obviously never asked at Ten, who go to New York when you are spending money bringing chefs to Australia (such as Nigella Lawson).

MasterChef seems to have lost its way quite a bit this year. It’s all a bit processed and manufactured, the freshness of year one and two have gone. The migration to New York only confirms it.

MasterChef was the most watched program nationally with 2.147 million viewers (532,000 in regional markets and 1.615 in the metros).

The finale of Dancing With The Stars also topped the 2 million level with 2.056 million (586,000 in the regions and 1.470 million in the metro markets).

Ten says its main channel, plus ONE and Eleven won the demos and were second in All People.

Saturday night’s Super 15 final between Queensland Reds and the Canterbury Crusaders smashed Pay TV audience records. The game, played in Brisbane and won by Queensland, averaged 518,000 viewers, the biggest ever Pay TV audience . The figure is the combined audience in metro markets for Fox Sports 3HD and Fox Sports 3.

It was the first time a Pay TV audience had topped the half million mark and beat the 431,000 previous record for the Socceroos and Uzbekistan game in April, 2009. The match also attracted 185,000 more viewers than the previous most watched Super Rugby broadcast, which was the 2008 final between the Crusaders and the NSW Waratahs.

TONIGHT: Q&A with the Prime Minister stands out on the ABC. Will Tony Abbott do it next week? That’s the highlight of the ABC’s four and a half hours of news and current affairs. Nine has The Block. Seven has The Amazing Race Australia, Ten has MasterChef Australia and Can of Worms. It’s a rest day in the Tour de France on SBS.

Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports