TV Overnights: BBC One’s Silent Witness takes the peak-time lead with 6.6m viewers

BBC One’s Silent Witness secured the highest ratings during the all-important 9pm to 10pm peak-hour last night.

The popular drama series, starring Emilia Fox, John Lynch and Emily Beecham, pulled in more than 6.5 million average viewers and a 24.8% audience share, seeing off competition from ITV1’s The Bill and Channel 4’s new documentary series.

The Bill attracted over 4.1 million viewers and a 15.6% average audience share, while C4’s new Kevin McCloud: Slumming It – a two-part documentary that saw the Grand Designs presenter travel to one of Asia’s biggest slums in Mumbai – picked up 2.8 million viewers and a 10.9% share.

Elsewhere, Five’s 9 o’clock film Attack Force with Steven Seagal pipped BBC Two to fourth place in the peak-time ratings war with a high of more than 1.1 million viewers.  BBC Two’s conclusion of Simon Schama on Obama’s America, meanwhile, started on 1 million viewers and settled with a 3.8% average audience share between 9pm and 10pm.

Earlier on in the evening, BBC One and ITV1’s dominated the ratings with their flagship soaps.  BBC One’s Eastenders claimed the top spot with a high of more than 10.5 million viewers, while ITV1’s Emmerdale and Coronation Street picked up 9.3 million and 9.9 million peak viewers respectively.

Overnight data is available each morning in mediatel.co.uk’s TV Database, with all BARB registered subscribers able to view reports for terrestrial networks and key multi-channel stations.