'News For You' return pulls in 6.1m

The return of Have I Got News For You brought in strong ratings to BBC One last night (Friday), overnight figures suggest.

The 36th series of the quiz show, guest hosted this week by Fern Britton, began with 6.08m (26.8%) at 9pm. The previous series, broadcast in the Spring, averaged around 5 million for the channel. Little Britain USA followed at 9.30pm with 4.67m (21.6%).

ITV1 drama Wire in the Blood held up well in the slot, averaging 4.69m (21.1%) for the hour. The American Future: A History, By Simon Schama lost out the most from the increased competition, shedding 600,000 on last week's debut to average 1.7m (7.7%) for BBC Two.

Ugly Betty ended its second season with just 1.37m (6.2%) for Channel 4, while Five's NCIS repeat logged 1.34m (6%) over the same period.

BBC One maintained its lead at 10pm with 4.5m (22.9%) watching The Ten O'Clock News. The Jonathan Ross Show improved to an impressive 4.13m (23.8%) at 10.35pm and on BBC Two, QI picked up 2.56m (13.1%). Al Murray's Happy Hour notched up 2.1m (11.8%) for ITV1 while Alan Carr's Celebrity Ding Dong continued to struggle with 1.09m (5.9%) on Channel 4. Five had 1.39m (7.8%) for Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.

Earlier, Coronation Street took the day's top honours with a storyline involving the death of key character Liam Connor. A first episode had 9.39m (44.2%) at 7.30pm, then the second instalment brought in 9.23m (39.6%) an hour later.

EastEnders was second with 8.41m (38.2%) at 8pm, with a further 510,000 (2.9%) watching on BBC Three later in the evening. Emmerdale had 6.74m (34.2%) at 7pm.

BBC Two had solid audiences of 2.1m (9.6%) for Mastermind and 2.11m (9.1%) for Gardeners' World in the 8pm hour, while Five pulled in a decent 1.36m (6%) for Police Interceptors. Channel 4 was last for the period, drawing just 1.04m (4.6%) with A Place In The Sun: Home Or Away.

Overall in primetime, ITV1 hung on to its lead with an average share of 25.4% (last week: 24.2%) to BBC One's 23.6% (21.6%). BBC Two had 8.1% (9.5%) for third, followed by Five on 5.5% (5.8%) and Channel 4 on 4.9% (5.7%).

Hollyoaks continued to pull in huge ratings for E4, with 1.15m (6.7%) tuning in for a first-look episode at 7pm and 133,000 (0.7%) watching on timeshift. The figure is almost double the number for last week.

Two episodes of Family Guy brought in 418,000 (5%) and 458,000 (7.6%) to BBC Three from 11.30pm and on ITV2, 346,000 (2%) watched a screening of comedy movie American Pie between 9pm and 11pm (+1: 79,000, 0.6%).

Ratings data supplied by Attentional