Also BBC1 only commissioned 4 episodes for series 2 of Luther after series 1 performed poorly only for series 2 to become a ratings hit.

D'oh!

That's the trouble when a show is repeated so often - will people even realise it's a new episode? And the build up has been more like the rumours of who will stay and go on The X Factor with the principle actors seemingly slagging the whole thing off for the last couple of weeks.

I suspect Harry's Mountain Heroes might do rather well for ITV1 too.

I thought it was generally accepted that the 1966 World Cup Final on BBC1 with an audience of 30 million was the most watched although they used a different ratings system in those days, they stopped people in the street and asked them what they had viewed the night before. But that would take account of people in pubs etc which BARB doesn't.

Last year New Tricks was the same, little trails and a lot of repeats through the year.

It still did amazing on show, the reason the show repeats so well is because people search out for the show.

I doubt that many pubs in 1966 showed the World Cup Final, or anything else for that matter. If you didn't have a telly, you had to find someone who did.

Or you stood outside Radio Rentals in the rain and watched.

Surely the fact they reverse these decisions when they become hits is a good thing, they weren't to know how popular they were to become. With Luther and George Gently the fact they brought it back in the first place (even with less episodes) despite mediocre ratings should be commended, giving them the chance to become the hits they are.

I've seen a New Tricks trailer but only once, I think the controversy behind the scenes has done enough for people to know it's back.

There has been trailers for New Tricks, seen it about 3 or 4 times in the last week. Guess it depends when you happen to be watching.

Some notable changes from last Sunday in all-day channel shares:

BBC3 down 45%: Reading Festival perhaps not a big draw?
Channel 4 up 33%: Kay effect?
ITV2 down 20%: I wonder how the repeats of TXF and its spin-off did
ITV4 up 60%: fair bit of live cycling/touring cars - not sure if more live action than last week
Watch up 175%: Hitch & Wild Wild West presumably did well
Dave up 67%: QI XL ran from 2pm till midnight
Channel 5 up 10%: boosted by Beauty and the Beast and generally solid evening performance

Source: Channel 4 Sales

Actually, I haven't watched much live telly at all this week for various reasons - so I can hardly bemoan the lack of trails!

I wonder why the Beeb haven't used the Bank Holiday to give Citizen Khan a possible 8-9m lead-in for its debut episode, instead of keeping the (reduced length) news at 10pm?

I doubt the non-Bank Holidaying Scots would have been too perturbed by the evening news airing 20 minutes later - and in any event, they could have kept it at 10pm in Scotland, as I see the BBC SIx airs at 5.30pm across the UK, except Scotland where it runs to normal at 6pm with Reporting Scotland following at 6.30pm.

I think by 1966 most homes would have a television. Pub televisions didn't really take off until the Sky era, prior to that a pub usually had( if it had a television) a 14 inch portable on the end of the bar.

Didn't most pubs close between 2 and 5.30 pm in those days although there might have been special licences on the day. My point however was that it has always gone down as the largest single channel audience in the UK with some 3 million watching on ITV as well. I've never seen figures for Churchill's funeral however, that must have been a record breaker.

Interesting: the need to show a full-length bulletin in Scotland means the schedules are jumbled north of the border, which will distort the overnight figures:

BBC One Scotland

06:00-14:45 - as Network
14:45 - Cash In The Attic (r, not shown in the rest of the UK)
15:30 - Escape to the Country (r, not shown in the rest of the UK)
16:30 - Wallace & Gromit @ the Proms (shown at 14:45 in the rest of the UK)
17:15 - Pointless (shown at 16:45 in the rest of the UK)
18:00 - News (shown at 17:30 in the rest of the UK)
18:30 - Reporting Scotland (regional news at 17:50 in the rest of the UK)

This also means that Scots miss out on Wallace & Gomit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit completely; it's not been moved elsewhere.

I agree that 22:00 would have been better for Citizen Khan, with a later start in Scotland. Again it would distort the overnights, but it would be sorted out in the consolidated figures, would it not, despite a different start time? Or would it be a case of "Excluding Scotland"?

If Corrie (20:30) does not get a record rating tonight, I may say it should be axed, it is up against The One Show: Best of Britain after all.

That is far too lazy on the BBCs part.

Very useful in a FreeSat household that watches both Deal Or No Deal and Pointless.


It's a repeat of a compilation (from just before the Olympics?).

Surely the only place The One Show compilations should air is at 7pm on occasions when The One Show isn't on. They shouldn't air as part of the rest of the schedule.

Staying with Scotland, the news hour from 18:00 means their showing of the Countryfile Summer Special moves to BBC2 at 19:00, which in turn bumps the first of the new series of Dig WW2 with Dan Snow to Tuesday. That is stripped over three nights, and Thursday is taken up with athletics, so the final episode is on Friday in Scotland. That has a knock-on effect on Hidcote: A Garden for All Seasons which isn't scheduled at all in Scotland but will be shown in the rest of the UK on Friday at 19:00.

It's just a mess. I see two solutions: harmonise Bank Holidays across the UK, or let Scotland go independent and let it set up its version of the BBC. (But not grabbing the BBC's assets, which Alex Salmond is talking about).

They made eight to use over Euro 2012, but presumably they didn't know exactly how many they needed because of not knowing what quarter final matches they were showing and when. So six where aired at Euro 2012, one was last Sunday at 6pm and the last in the series is tonight. Not great - but better than what they have done before on a bank holiday which is a normal schedule with a live One Show and even Panorama. At least there's a couple of special bank holiday programmes in the early evening, plus two big new series.

The final was on a Saturday and pubs closed between 3 and 6. I'm sure the final was in the evening when the pubs would be open.

Ho ho, can we get rid of Emmerdale as well? Actually ITV would be sunk on weekdays without its two soaps. I know they're as boring as hell, but 6-8 million people enjoy them,

That's a novel angle for Alec Salmond to take: "Vote for Scottish independence or the overnight ratings will be bug**red up every August".

Making Scotland independent seems a fairly extreme reaction to a few schedule changes! I think they'll be a few more important considerations somehow... The schedules in the nations have always been a bit messy so they can fit in there own programmes, it's not something that's exclusive to Bank holidays. It probably could be done a bit better but it's no biggy.

I was thinking more about the poor Scots missing out on programmes for no good reason. But then if they went independent, they probably wouldn't be able to afford many programmes anyway.

Maybe I'm getting too worked up about this.

Maybe revive Take The Valium( err High Road) every night, which would probably persuaded more Scots to get a satellite dish and tune into English channels. Actually this was cancelled when STV realised most of the audience were either dead or over 70.

There are so many implications of a Scottish split that pop up when you think about things: they probably wouldn't have a BARB any more: it would be a SARB

That made me spit out my coffee!