'Talent' boosts ITV News to 6.1m

ITV's News At Ten attracted a massive 6.14m (29.5%) last night after a strong lead-in from Britain's Got Talent, the latest ratings figures show.

The half-hour bulletin was up from an average of around 2.5m, beating the BBC's Ten O'Clock News, which was seen by 3.58m (16.8%).

Talent continued to perform well for ITV, averaging 12.31m (51.2%) between 8.30pm and 10pm with the latest semi-final. The show, which saw saxophone player Julian Smith and grandfather-granddaughter duo Two Grand put through to the live final, peaked with 13.63m (54.3%) at 9.30pm.

Spinoff Britain's Got More Talent was the most-watched programme on the multichannel stations, drawing 918k (5.4%) for ITV2 at 10pm. A further 112k (1.1%) tuned in on timeshift.

BBC One documentary Tourettes: I Swear I Can't Help It had 2.46m (10%) during the 9pm hour. Earlier on the channel, the half-hour documentary On The Fiddle, which followed the Department for Work Fraud team as they attempted to expose benefit cheats, put in 3.29m (16.1%). The audience then fell to 2.03m (8.9%) during the 8.30pm screening of My Family.

Springwatch delivered 2.77m (12.8%) for BBC Two at 8pm, then the final episode of Keep It In The Family was seen by 1.21m (4.9%) at 9pm.

Over on Channel 4, a lowly 800k (3.7%) tuned in for George Clarke's The Home Show at 8pm. The audience then rose to 1.06m (4.3%) during the 9pm screening of Cutting Edge film The Building Inspector Is Coming.

Five's The Mentalist was affected by the Talent clash, logging a disappointing 1.53m (6.2%) at 9pm. Last week, the show had averaged a solid 2.28m (10.4%). Earlier on the channel, a repeat of Paul Merton In India drew 413k (1.9%).

Overall, ITV1 dominated primetime with an average share of 38.1% to BBC One's 16.3%. BBC Two was third with 7.2%, followed by Channel 4 with 4.5% (+1: 0.6%) and Five's 3.7%.

Elsewhere, the last ever episode of medical drama ER put in a respectable 893k (4.4%) for More4 at 9pm. It followed on from Previously On ER, a series of memorable moments from the show's 15 seasons, which was seen by 634k (3.2%) at 8.05pm.

The season four finale of Bones grabbed 468k (2.1%) for Sky1.

Ratings data supplied by Attentional