The battle for TV's news audience

Declining news audiences: A concern for both ITV and BBC

One of the most contentious issues surrounding the BBC's move to a 10pm news slot has been the consequences for the TV news audience.

The BBC maintains that the rescheduling of the news has successfully halted a long term decline in news audiences.

But ITV's news provider ITN says that the falling trend in BBC news audiences identified in the late 1990s has not been halted.

For four of the year's biggest news stories the BBC's Ten O'Clock news beat ITV's late night news - which can be scheduled for other times than 10pm.

Click here to see the ratings

But both late bulletins tend to record smaller audiences than the early evening news.

The BBC now claims an average audience to its 2200 bulletin of five million - the same as the average audience recorded for the Nine O'Clock News.

It says it has stabilised viewing figures, as its 2100 bulletin had been losing viewers by an average of 250,000 a year.

Younger viewers

ITN says that this decline is a continuing trend - and argues that by moving the BBC bulletin to 2200 the BBC has "narrowed consumer choice".

In truth, both channels are concerned by a drift away from TV news among younger viewers, who are faced, particularly in multi-channel households, with ever more choice.

It is a sign of the times that on 16 July, both the BBC's Ten O'Clock News and ITV's News at Ten were beaten in the ratings war by Channel 4's reality TV show Big Brother.

Just 4.7 million people tuned in to watch the BBC's flagship news show on that day and 3.4 million tuned in to ITV's News at Ten - while five million saw the latest update from the Big Brother house.

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1. Foot and Mouth

The animal disease epidemic was identified in the UK in February, and the mass slaughter of farm animals in response began on Sunday 24 February. On that day the top four news bulletins were:

BBC 2200: 5.6m (a 25% share of viewing)

BBC 1725: 5.1m (33% share)

ITN 1730: 3.8m (24% share)

ITN 2300: 3.7m (25% share)

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2. Selby rail crash

On Wednesday 28 February 10 people were killed when a car left the road and ended up on a railway line, causing a freight train and a passenger train to collide. The top four bulletins that day were:

BBC 1800: 7.3m (a 36% share of viewing)

BBC 2200: 7.1m (33% share)

ITV 1830: 6m (28% share)

ITV 2230: 4.5m (27% share)

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3. Election result

On Thursday 7 June Labour was re-elected with 413 seats and a majority of 167. There was continuous TV coverage on the night, but the next day (8 June) news viewers could see the final results. The top four news bulletins were:

BBC 1800: 5.7m (a 35% share of viewing)

BBC 2200: 5.3m (26% share)

ITV 1830: 4.5m (27% share)

ITV 2300: 2.8m (20% share)

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4. Jill Dando verdict

On Monday 2 July Barry George was found guilty of the murder of TV presenter Jill Dando after an eight-week trial, sentenced to life imprisonment. The top four bulletins that day were:

BBC 10pm: 5.7m (a 28% share of viewing)

BBC 6pm: 4.5m (29% share)

ITV 6.30pm: 3.9m (24% share)

ITV 10pm: 3.7m (18% share)

For more routine news nights, all news viewing figures are lower.

(Figures from BARB Consolidated Data)