Borrowed from another forum, here are the ratings for last night's BBC Regional News at 6.30, split by region and in order of audience share.
Spotlight 347,000 43.30%
East Midlands Today 325,000 38.80%
Look North (Leeds & Hull) 991,000 37.10%
South East Today 401,000 37.00%
Look East 614,000 34.90%
Points West 276,000 34.50%
Reporting Scotland 717,000 31.90%
Newsline 218,000 30.10%
South Today 602,000 29.00%
BBC London News 1,080,000 28.30%
Wales Today 346,000 27.90%
Midlands Today 682,000 27.80%
North West Tonight 639,000 25.50%
Look North (Newcastle) 340,000 22.40%
There's some impressive figures there, I wonder what they would have been without the snow?
Incidently, years ago when the national weather was on at just before 7pm and the regionals had their weather half way through there was a big dip in audience at 6:45, people watch for the weather and then turn off. I think they were all glad when it was moved
Interesting breakdown. I know Spotlight has always been very popular (look at that share!)
Also interesting that some of the top ranking regions are the regions that don't really exist separately in ITV terms (No Westcountry, Central News East or Meridian East full shows any more), whereas the regions with lower shares DO have much more direct ITV equivalents (ITV London, ITV Wales, Granada etc.)
Interesting breakdown. I know Spotlight has always been very popular (look at that share!)
Is there any other programme on TV that gets 43% share? I think there are BBC local radio stations that get similar, particuarly in the South West and maybe Shropshire and Cumbria
I believe if Look North Leeds and Hull are split - which they should be as they are entirely independent services now - then actually Look North Hull is at the top of the list
This also backs up the theory of regions with poor/no equivalent ITV service
That's a very interesting breakdown, although not one programme has less than 25% audience share, the ITV ratings could make very interesting reading.
Although I think those regions affected by the really bad weather, ie the ones mainly on the east coast of the UK will have probably seen their ratings rise because of it.
I subscribe to Gordon Burns' newsletter and he said when the bad weather hit us in January, North West Tonight managed to top 1 Million viewers, which is an achievement if 640,000 is average.
Interesting breakdown. I know Spotlight has always been very popular (look at that share!)
Is there any other programme on TV that gets 43% share? I think there are BBC local radio stations that get similar, particuarly in the South West and maybe Shropshire and Cumbria
Not sure what it gets now, but the One O'Clock News used to get 50% and higher in the mid-00s. It still gets a huge spike now. It doesn't do the volume of the Six and Ten, but gets very good shares.
I think shows like BGT and X Factor also get that level of share as well. No mean feat in the days of multi-channel (though AIUI multichannel does less well during peak)
I subscribe to Gordon Burns' newsletter and he said when the bad weather hit us in January, North West Tonight managed to top 1 Million viewers, which is an achievement if 640,000 is average.
Yep - in the bad weather earlier this year the BBC 1830 opt (as an average across all regions) got amazingly high figures (30-50% higher than normal) ISTR. I think on one day the 1830 got something around 8.5-9million, and The One Show that followed got over 7million (the day they did an hour-long snow special)
I seem to recall at the worst of the weather, the Regional News broke the 10 million mark. Did i imagine that?
Also are the Channel Island ratings incorporated into Spotlight's ratings? I never know if they're still a sub-opt or not these days.
BBC CI is still, AFAIK, a sub-opt most of the time (like BBC Cambridge). Interesting that Leeds and Hull, which are pretty much entirely separate, are reported combined.
What would be interesting to see is if the reason for the differences is because ITV regional news programmes get higher ratings or whether regional news is not watched as much in certain areas as others.
I seem to recall at the worst of the weather, the Regional News broke the 10 million mark. Did i imagine that?
Also are the Channel Island ratings incorporated into Spotlight's ratings? I never know if they're still a sub-opt or not these days.
BBC CI is still, AFAIK, a sub-opt most of the time (like BBC Cambridge). Interesting that Leeds and Hull, which are pretty much entirely separate, are reported combined.
AIUI it's more to do with the size of the sample that BARB have in the region. While there is are separate reports for viewing figures from Rowridge, Hannington and Oxford for BBC South, the sample for Oxford is so small it isn't statistically reliable enough apparently to be officially reported. As such South's figures are always officially relelased as combined ratings. Maybe a similar thing happens with the Leeds and Hull samples...