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The highest audience figures for a decade have been seen on Â鶹Éç One Wales and Â鶹Éç Two Wales in 2013/14, according to the Â鶹Éç Annual Report and Â鶹Éç Audience Council Wales annual review published today.  

The early evening news bulletin Â鶹Éç Wales Today also hit record highs, being watched by an average of 305,000 people.

The Audience Council Wales, the Â鶹Éç Trust’s advisory body, welcomed the Â鶹Éç’s successes in Wales and the programme highlights this year.  These included Y Gwyll/Hinterland, which was broadcast in three versions in partnership with S4C - Welsh, bilingual, and English – for the first time to audiences in Wales and then across the UK.  The Live Longer Wales season of programmes across TV, radio and online reached almost 40 per cent of adults in Wales.

Â鶹Éç Wales continued to make a strong contribution to programmes for audiences across the UK, with an average of nearly 12 million people tuning in to the latest series of Sherlock making it the most-watched Â鶹Éç drama series for over a decade and the most requested drama ever on Â鶹Éç iPlayer.  The 50th anniversary episode of Doctor Who, also produced in Cardiff, was simulcast to 98 countries around the world. 

Â鶹Éç Radio Wales continued to perform strongly with an average of 468,000 people listening every week. Â鶹Éç Radio Cymru increased its audience reach by 13 per cent, launched an extensive public consultation with its listeners and subsequently re-launched its weekday schedule.

The Audience Council also welcomed the launch of Â鶹Éç One Wales HD and recent improvements to DAB coverage of Â鶹Éç Radio Wales and Radio Cymru, up from 41 per cent to 61 per cent.

The Council, which held 18 events this year to gather the views of audiences, has stressed the need for further improvement to both DAB and FM coverage of Radio Wales and expressed concern that UK-wide Â鶹Éç network news still does not properly reflect post-devolution UK.  While the Council concluded that there had been some progress, it said that there were still insufficient comparisons of legal and policy positions in the different nations of the UK.  The Council also highlighted audience concerns about the continuing decline in the amount of English language non-news TV programmes produced by Â鶹Éç Wales for Welsh audiences, which has decreased by 21 per cent since 2007/8.

Â鶹Éç Trustee for Wales Elan Closs Stephens said:

"With record audiences over the last year it’s clear that Â鶹Éç Cymru Wales is delivering for audiences in Wales and the outstanding programmes over the last year are testament to that.  In addition drama made in Wales for the whole UK goes from strength to strength and Radio Cymru brought in more listeners. 

"However, it is a matter of concern that the Audience Council has identified ongoing issues with the way that Â鶹Éç network news reflects Wales, and a lack of English-language TV programmes, particularly comedy and drama, produced in Wales for Wales.  The Trust will continue to work with the Â鶹Éç to address these concerns in the coming year."

Notes to editors

1. The Audience Council Wales Annual Review for 2013/14 can be found here
2. The Â鶹Éç Annual Report and Accounts for 2013/14 can be found here
3. The Â鶹Éç management annual review for Wales can be found here.